ral 



ill 



1 



wR 



i 



■ ■ 






SB 

■ 



UHmHk 



I 

T 

I 

■ 



i 



in 



n ■ mi 

HI 

illl BBH8B8W 

II 



mil 



BBMX 

PHflfflfflMfi 



III Hmni 



HI IraM 



BRl 



www 

KluifKlftflHM 



mm 



(BRiUUfHffKftnmi 



Hflilti 



IP 



Hi 



91 



JM1 

■IIH 
SHhI 



rf> it . n o -AT 'O *" , ^ \ ,*.' 

0> . * • o , ^. * ■ i V X V & 











.<y * 1 " / v. 












h A 



-%. 



"S 



VOICES OF THE NIGHT. 



By 

THE REV. JOHN CUMMING, D.D., 

r • 

Of the Scottish Church, Crown Court, Covent Garden. 
AUTHOR OF " VOICES OF THE DAY," " VOICES OF THE DEAD," ETC. ETC. 



The Night is far spent— the Day is at hand."— Rom. xiii. 12. 



All forms of sorrow and delight, 
All solemn voices of the night 
That can s~oth thee." 



EsntT) CTjou^antr, QSiilxvQtQ. 



LONDON : 
VIRTUE, HALL, AND VIRTUE, 

25, PATERNOSTER ROW, 
AND 26, JOHN STREET, NEW YORK. 



PREFACE. 



This Volume is meant to be a sort of 
whispering- gallery, in which may be heard the 
manifold and mingled Voices of " the night now 
far spent." Amid that darkness which thickens 
as the dawn draws near, and in the wilderness 
whose intricacies grow more perplexing as 
the land of promise is approached, the travel- 
ler watching for sunrise, and sometimes at a 
loss which way to turn, may be directed and 
perhaps encouraged by these echoes of celes- 
tial voices borne earthward, sounding at times 
a promise, at times an encouragement, and 






IV PREFACE. 

always a direction — " This is the Tray, walk 
ye in it." 

The writer believes that every Voice he has 
sought to make audible has its origin in the 
Word of God. Its key-note is there. The 
harmonies he has arranged are combinations, 
not creations of his own. It is this that 
encourages him to hope that, beyond the 
reach of his own voice, these will be heard; 
and that, by the pillows of the dying, in the 
chambers of the sick, and amid the vigils of 
the dead, the truths that subdue, sustain, and 
sanctify — that, like delicate aromatic perfumes, 
penetrate where coarser consolations are inac- 
cessible — may find hospitality, and, "received 
as angels unawares," leave deep and abiding 
impressions behind them. 

Most of these "Voices/:' in somewhat dif- 
ferent forms, were uttered from the pulpit. 
One, from the eighth chapter of the Epistle 
to the Romans, was preached in St. George's 



PREFACE, V 

Church, Glasgow, before the Society of the 
Sons of the Clergy; and to those who ex- 
pressed their desire to see it in a permanent 
form, it is hoped it may prove acceptable in 
its present. 

To some these Voices have sonnded very mu- 
sical. To those whose heart-strings have been 
re-tuned, they will still prove soft chimes borne 
from above, suggestive, and even sanctifying. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER L 

Page 
What of the Night ? ....... 1 

CHAPTER II. 
The Morning cometh, and also the Night . . 39 

CHAPTER III. 
Earth not your Rest ...... 66 

CHAPTER IV. 
A Rest for Christians ... . • . 93 

CHAPTER V. 
Nature's Travail and Expectancy . . . .128 

CHAPTER VI. 
The Christian's Agony and Hope . . . .167 

CHAPTER VII. 
Present Suffering and Future Glory . • . 200 



VU1 CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER VIII. 

Page 

Remaining Duties 235 

CHAPTER IX. 
"Excelsior" 269 

CHAPTER X. 
The World-copy . 298 

CHAPTER XI. 
The Transformed Mind 814 

CHAPTER XII. 
The Time-haze 327 

CHAPTER XIII. 
The Inheritance 355 

CHAPTER XIV. 
Spent and Mis-spent 386 

CHAPTER XV, 
Nearing Sunrise 414 

CHAPTER XVI. 
The Voice Crying in the Desert .... 444 



CHAPTER I. 

WHAT OF THE NIGHT | 

** Watching on the hills of faith, 
Listening what the Spirit saith 
Of the dim-seen liyht afar, 
Growing like a nearing star — 

a ' God's interpreter art thou 
To the waiting ones below ; 
'Twixt them and its light midway, 
Heralding the better day ! 

** ' Catching gleams of temple spires- 
Hearing notes of angel choirs— 
Where, as yet unseen of them, 
Comes the new Jerusalem.' " 

"The burden of Dumah. He calleth to me out of Seir, 
Watchman, what of the night? Watchman, what of the 
night ? The watchman said, The morning cometh, and also 
the night : if ye will enquire, enquire ye : return, come." — 
Isaiah xxi. 1 1, 12. 

The words prefixed to this chapter may- 
have a primary meaning applicable to local 
circumstances and to temporary events ; but it 
seems to me that the words have an ulterior 
meaning, and remain yet to be fulfilled, if 
indeed they are not now actually fulfilling. 

B 



2 WHAT OF THE NIGHT f 

The expression "burden" is frequently used 
by the Prophets. It denotes that some great 
message has been entrusted to them, which 
lies, from its sorrowful contents, like a load or 
burden on their souls; that they are charged 
with a solemn but a sad embassy ; commanded, 
in short, to bear tidings which must be told, 
though the heart should break while the lips 
give utterance to them; and that there is a 
weight upon their spirits, and their spirits can 
only be unloaded by letting that weight fall 
where the wisdom and the will of God had 
fixed that it should fall. The minister of the 
gospel is not like the prophet of old. His is a 
joyful work : he is appointed to proclaim good 
tidings — " glad tidings of great joy." He is, 
indeed, the ambassador of God, but his embassy 
is an embassy of gladness ; and while the pro- 
phet's spirit must have often sunk beneath the 
weight of the calamities he was commissioned 
to predict, the spirit of the minister of the 
gospel should feel his message to be wings to 
soar with, rather than a weight by which to be 
depressed; for he proclaims clearly a Saviour 
— Christ the Lord — glad tidings to all people ! 
And yet the minister of the gospel has some 



WHAT OF THE NIGHT f 



messages not so joyful. When he sees the 
sword gleaming in the distant horizon, and 
ready to fall upon a guilty people, it is his duty, 
as a watchman, to say so ; when he sees sin in- 
dulged in that must end in the ruin of a people, 
it is his duty to lift up his yoice like a trumpet, 
and announce distinctly and intelligibly what it 
leads to. While the minister's chief message 
is joy, there are thus parts of it that must be 
sadness; and no portion of it is more sad or 
more solemn to be thought of than this — that 
the gospel preached during each year has been 
to some in his congregation, as he must fear, 
a savour of death, though he may rejoice also, 
that it has been to others a sayour of life. 
We have lately passed through years darkened 
by overwhelming clouds; through scenes and 
circumstances that have shaken the firmest 
nerves, and made to quail the strongest hearts. 
They who profess to have a wider range of 
vision, see yet heavier calamities louring in 
the distant horizon. Whether it shall be so 
or not, Ave know not. This, however, we do 
know : be Christians, and all things will turn 
up their sunny sides to you, and the very 
sounds that convulse the universe shall come 



4 WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 

to you in music, because they are the intima- 
tions that your redemption draweth nigh, and 
that the home and the kingdom of your Father 
is approaching nearer, day by day. 

"Duniah" is only another form of expression 
for " Iduinea," the Country of Edom. It is one 
of the names given to Edom by the prophet. 
It lay south of Palestine, and was peopled by 
the descendants of Esau, Jacob's brother : its 
capital city was Petra. I need not tell you what 
God has here said of Petra, or Seir, and how 
strictly it has been fulfilled ; most of the works 
that treat of the fulfilment of ancient prophecy 
refer to Idumea, or Dumah, or Edom, with Petra, 
its capital, as at present — a most striking 
evidence of the minute fulfilment of God's 
predictions. "Edom," said God, "shall be a 
wilderness; a line of confusion and stones of 
emptiness shall it be. I will lay thy cities waste, 
and thou shalt be desolate, and Mount Seir (i.e. 
the hill on which Petra was built) I will make 
a perpetual desolation/' Every traveller who 
has visited that country, and inspected the site 
and rocky caves of Petra, testifies that every 
prediction of God respecting it has been literally 
and minutely fulfilled. The origin of the quarrel 



WHAT OF THE NIGHT t 5 

between Edom or Idumea and the children 
of Israel — a quarrel that is alluded to fre- 
quently by Isaiah and by all the prophets — 
was early in origin and lasting in effect. The 
strife between Jacob and Esau was perpetuated 
in their descendants ; for the children of Edom, 
who sprang from Esau, carried on a constant 
hostility, whenever the opportunity occurred, 
with the children of Jacob or the tribes of 
Israel. This quarrel was renewed in one of 
its bitterest forms, when the Israelites were 
passing through the wilderness in order to 
reach the promised land: they had, as a map 
will easily show, to pass through the land of 
Edom, before they could reach Palestine. 
When Moses came to Dumah or Idumea, as 
it is recorded in Numbers xx. 14, "He sent 
messengers unto the king of Edom, Thus 
saith thy brother Israel" — affectionate and 
Christian language addressed by Moses, as the 
head of the tribes of Israel, to the children of 
Esau, and a precedent for us to use kind lan- 
guage at least — never a very great sacrifice, 
even to the bitterest foe with whom we have 
to contend — " Thus saith thy brother Israel, 
Thou knowest all the travel that hath befallen 



6 WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 

us." Moses appeals to liis pity : " How our 
fathers went down into Egypt, and we have 
dwelt in Egypt a long time ; . . . And when we 
cried nnto the Lord, he heard our voice, and 
sent an angel, and hath brought us forth out 
of Egypt : and, behold, we are in Kadesh, a 
city in the uppermost part of thy border. Let 
us pass, I pray thee, through thy country : we 
will not pass through the fields, or through the 
vineyards, neither will we drink of the water of 
thy wells ; we will go by the king's highway, 
we will not turn to the right hand nor to the 
left, until we have passed thy borders." What 
a beautiful Christian spirit actuates Moses 
in speaking thus to a known, relentless, and 
bitter foe ! You would suppose that Edom 
would thus have replied to the peaceful mes- 
sage of Moses: u You are a people that have 
come forth from the depths of oppression and 
bondage in Egypt, — you are weary and way- 
worn with a long and perilous journey; you 
ask what is reasonable ; and if you will main- 
tain the discipline you promise among the half 
million of followers by whom you are sur- 
rounded, you will be quite welcome to pass 
along our highway towards your own land."" 



WHAT OF THE NIGHT ? 7 

"But Edom said unto him, Thou shalt not 
pass by me, lest I come out against thee with 
the sword. And the children of Israel said 
unto him, We will go by the highway ; and if I 
and my cattle drink of thy water, then will I 
pay for it : I will only without doing any thing 
else, go through on my feet. And he said, 
Thou shalt not go through." What obstinacy, 
antipathy, and bitter hatred lurked in the 
King of Edonr's heart! "And Edom came 
out against him with much people, and with 
a strong hand. Thus Edom refused to give 
Israel passage through his border : wherefore 
Israel" did not instantly fall upon him, and 
make war upon him, which would be the taste 
of the day, the vote of the multitude, but 
"turned away from him," and went another 
way. We find the quarrel begun between 
Jacob and Esau thus perpetuated ; and such 
was the hostility that still rankled in the de- 
scendants of Esau, that they would neither 
give the passage as a favour, nor accept a price 
for it. 

Now, some think that the various references 
in the Prophets to the judgments which were 
to come upon Edom, refer entirely to the time 



8 WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 

when Israel was carried away captive into 
Babylon,, on which occurrence the children of 
Edom, instead of being sorry, as they might 
have been expected to be, laughed, rejoiced, 
and triumphed that at last they had gained a 
victory, without struggle, through the judgment 
of God, which had thus fallen on their ene- 
mies. That some allusion is made to this 
epoch, I think is plain, from what is stated in 
Psalm cxxxvii. : " By the rivers of Babylon, 
there (say the Jews) we sat down, yea, we wept, 
when we remembered Zion," &c. ; and then, at 
ver. 7, "Remember, O Lord, the children of 
Edom in the day of Jerusalem ; who said, Base 
it, rase it, even to the foundation thereof" — 
as if, when Jerusalem was destroyed by the 
Chaldeans, and the Jews were led away captive, 
the children of Edom, instead of expressing 
sympathy with a discrowned king, and a scat- 
tered population, gave utterance to the laugh 
and shout of merriment and exultation, be- 
cause the people whom they hated, and whose 
passage to their own land they had obstructed 
with such inveterate antipathy, had now been 
]aid desolate, and carried into captivity to 
the banks of the Euphrates. The passage 



WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 9 

of Scripture at the head of this chapter, may 
refer to this period ; but it appears, from read- 
ing all that is said of Edom, that Edom is 
used throughout the ancieut Prophets, in a 
great number of passages, as a type of the 
unbelieving nations among the Gentiles — just 
as Babylon is plainly used to describe the great 
apostasy which was to grow up in the lc#cr 
ages of the world, and finally to be consumed 
by "the spirit of the Lord's mouth, and by 
the brightness of His coming." Babylon, 
which was the name of the literal city, which 
was literally destroyed, and which was then 
the stronghold of apostasy from the true God, 
is applied in the Book of Revelation univer- 
sally to the Church of Rome — it being the 
modern Babylon, the mystery of iniquity, 
whose doom is fixed by that tribunal whose 
decision never can be reversed ; and so Edom 
has been understood by the most impartial 
readers of ancient prophecy to have a range of 
judgments associated with it, and to be asso- 
ciated itself with an epoch in the history of 
the world which can be no other than the last 
days of the last epoch, in which a night of over- 
whelming darkness is to fall, though out of 



10 WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 

which a morn of beauty and imperishable 
brightness is destined also to evolve. "We 
read, for instance, in Isaiah xxxiv., a striking 
description of judgments that must have 
reference to something ulterior. In verses 
4 and 5 of that chapter, we read : " All the host 
of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens 
shall be rolled together as a scroll : and all 
their hosts shall fall down, as the leaf falleth 
from the vine, and as a falling fig from the 
fig-tree. For my sword shall be bathed in 
heaven : behold, it shall come down upon 
Idumea." You may read at your leisure Isaiah 
xxxiv., and you will see that, under the name 
of Edom or Idumea, judgments are predicted 
so sweeping, so desolating, and so terrible, that 
they must refer to an era subsequent to the 
age of Edom as a regular kingdom, and to a 
people of whom Idumea was only a type. 
That this interpretation is correct will be seen 
by our consideration of some of the passages; 
— Isaiah xxxiv., for instance, describes a series 
of judgments so overwhelming, that they must 
go beyond Idumea; so chap. xxxv. describes a 
scene of beauty and of blessedness so unclouded 
and so unbroken, that it must refer to some- 



WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 11 

thing beyond this dispensation. It is imme- 
diately after the judgments upon Edom pro- 
nounced in Isaiah xxxiv. have ceased, that the 
blessings, which clearly are millennial bless- 
ings, contained in chap, xxxv., begin. For 
instance, this has never yet been realised : 
" And an highway shall be there, and a way, 
and it shall be called the way of holiness : the 
unclean shall not pass over it ; but it shall be 
for those : the wayfaring men, though fools, 
shall not err therein. No lion shall be there, 
nor any ravenous beast shall go up thereon, it 
shall not be found there ; but the redeemed 
shall walk there : and the ransomed of the Lord 
shall return, and come to Zion with songs 
and everlasting joy upon their heads : they 
shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and 
sighing shall flee away." These words, which 
delineate what is to succeed the desolation of 
Edom, surely describe a scene of peace, and a 
catalogue of blessings which have never been 
actualised in the experience of Mankind. And 
if chap, xxxv., in which this scene occurs, de- 
scribes a scene of millennial glory, as I might 
easily prove, if necessary, this chapter xxxiv., 
which describes havoc and ruin upon Idumea, 



12 WHAT OF THE NIGHT ? 

must be a detail of judgments on the nations 
immediately preceding the millennium. And 
therefore the text, and the question and answer 
contained therein, whilst primarily relating to 
Idumea, refer to it, nevertheless, as the pedestal 
for the exhibition of scenes, and circumstances, 
and persons, long subsequent to the period of 
the existence of Idumea as a nation, — even the 
scenes, and circumstances, and ages in which 
our lot is now cast. 

Now, at this time, which I believe to be 
the very era in which Ave now stand, and 
which I think to be so from great prophetic 
epochs rolling rapidly to their conclusion, a 
solitary watchman — some Christian minister, 
whose heart sympathises with the Jew, not 
with the inhabitants of Edom rejoicing over 
their ruin — some Christian minister, who be- 
lieves God's word, that his ancient people 
are not cast off for ever, and that there is 
a bright day yet for those who have been 
the children of so long and so black a night 
— is seen by the prophet standing tiptoe upon 
the loftiest rock, boulder, or ruin of ancient 
Jerusalem, and straining his eyes, as he 
gazes into the East, if, peradventure, there 



WHAT OF THE NIGHT ? 13 

shall fall upon that eye some solitary strag* 
gling beam that will prove to him that the 
great Sun of Righteousness is but a very 
few degrees below the horizon, and is soon 
to emerge; that the night of Jerusalem is 
drawing to its close, and the light of the 
millennial day beginning to dawn with the 
rising sun. The vision of the prophet is, 
that of a watchman — a Christian minister, 
standing amid the ruins of that once great 
capital, looking up and gazing if he can catch 
the least token that the sun is about to rise, 
the night of sorrow about to retire, and the 
day-light of joy and peace to take its place. 
Whilst this watchman is thus waiting, looking, 
listening, marking all the signs and symbols 
that denote the approaching day, and hoping, 
and misgiving, and hoping again, but still 
clinging to God's promises, convinced that 
what he has predicted is sure to be performed, 
a proud scorner, seated on Mount Seir, the 
mount on which Petra, the capital of Idumea, 
was built — some proud, insolent, haughty scep- 
tic, whose Messiah is money — whose millennium 
is the predominence of the moneyed interest 
— calls from Mount Seir, in scorn and derision. 



14 WHAT OF THE NIGHT ? 

and says: "I.have heard that you watchmen, 
you prophets, you ministers, you millenarians, 
if there be any of the name, believe that these 
Jews are to be restored. Why, watchman, 
Providence is very long about it. You have 
been standing amid those ruins and those dis- 
mantled towers for some eighteen centuries, 
straining your eyes, neglecting the making of 
money and the dnty of providing for your 
children, and getting a comfortable place and a 
rich living, and have been looking and longing 
for the return of that miserable outcast nation, 
the Jews : well, watchman, you have waited so 
long, What of the night ? What evidence have 
you that this morn will ever break ? " For my 
part," says this proud scorner — this rich in- 
habitant of this rich capital, " I don't believe 
one word of your prophecies. They are an- 
tiquated notions — old remains of the old pro- 
phets of a dispensation that has passed away. 
There are no more signs that the Jews will be 
restored in 1851, than there were when Jerusalem 
was broken down by the ploughshare of Titus, 
and the Jew sent a wanderer and a by-word 
over all the earth." This scorner from Mount 
Seir — this atheistic man, whose sole worship is 



WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 15 

money-making, and whose God is mammon — 
will also say : u Palestine is still just as it was, 
a people Avithout a nation, and a nation in 
Palestine without a people ; the rocks and the 
arid sand are its only soil; dust is its only 
rain ; the plagues of the people are still many ; 
the bird of prey still flaps his broad wings upon 
its air ; the jackal is the only inhabitant of its 
dreary caves, and graves, and dens;" and the 
"whole land," even a sceptic will be obliged to 
say, because he must acknowledge facts — facts 
which are simply the echoes of God's ancient 
prophecy — "the whole land is brimstone, and 
salt, and burning : there is nothing that it bears, 
nor is there any grass in it." And even Cha- 
teaubriand, who went to visit Palestine, in the 
course of his travels, when he walked over it and 
saw its terrible desolation, made the following 
striking commentary on ancient prophecy : " We 
perceived Jerusalem through an opening in the 
mount. I did not at first know what it was. 
I believed it to be only a mass of shattered 
rocks. The sudden apparition of this city of 
desolation in the midst of such wasted solitudes, 
had something about it altogether fearful. She 
was then, indeed, in the valley of the desert." 



16 WHAT OP THE NIGHT? 

So the scoffer from Mount Seir, or, if you 
like to change the locality, the scoffer from our 
own metropolis, or from that across the Chan- 
nel, asks, " Watchman, what of the night ? 
Are those ruins beginning to rise into that 
glorious structure of Ezekiel that you have 
talked about? Does the grass begin to grow 
green beneath the hoof of the Arab's horse ? 
or beneath the naked foot of the tonsured 
monk? Is there any evidence that the sun is 
about to rise above the horizon? Your pro- 
spect is poor, watchman — leave the rocks; show 
more common sense ; go and make money, try 
to be rich and renowned; cease to anticipate 
any such impossibility." Let me remind such 
of what one has said whose testimony a Chris- 
tian at least will not dispute : " Knowing this 
first, that there shall come in the last days 
scoffers, walking after their own lusts, and 
saying (just the very thing that was said here), 
Where is the promise of his coming ? for since 
the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as 
they were from the beginning of the creation." 
This, these scoffers " willingly are ignorant of, 
that by the word of God the heavens were of 
old, and the earth standing out of the water 



WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 17 

and in the water; whereby the world that then 
was, being overflowed with water, perished; but 
the heavens and the earth, which are now, 
by the same word are kept in store, reserved 
unto fire against the day of judgment and per- 
dition of ungodly men •" or, as the word should 
be literally rendered, "The earth that now is 
is stored with fire against the day of judgment 
and perdition of ungodly men. But," adds St. 
Peter, turning from these scoffers, "beloved, 
be not ignorant of this one thing, that one day 
is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a 
thousand years as one day. The Lord is not 
slack concerning his promise, as some men 
count slackness" — as the watchman from 
Mount Seir declares — "but is longsuffering to 
us-ward, not willing that any should perish, 
but that all should come to repentance. But 
the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the 
night;" just when men see no sign of His 
advent unexpectedly ; "in the which the 
heavens shall pass away with a great noise, 
and the elements shall melt with fervent heat ; 
the earth also, and the works that are therein, 
shall be burned up." We have thus con- 
sidered the question put to the watchman by 

c 



18 WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 

the scoffer, predicted by Isaiah, who is only a 
type of the scoffers predicted by St. Peter to 
arise in the last days. 

Then the watchman replies to this insolent, 
derisive question — for do not forget that such 
is the light in which yon are to look at it — with 
great calmness, and with a quiet confidence 
that indicates his thorough conviction of the 
truth : " The morning cometh :" you may say 
what you like, you may talk of prospects as 
you like ; you may lay down probabilities as 
you like ; but " the morning cometh •" it is a 
: fixed thing. God's word is stronger than man's 
' facts ; you may stand upon a promise of the 
'Almighty firmer than on the strongest build- 
\ ing of man, or on the everlasting hills. " The 
i morning," says the watchman, " cometh, and 
also the night. If ye will enquire, enquire ye." 
" The morning cometh." Now let' me look 
at this first. As the question of the scoffer is 
derisively asked with reference to the restora- 
tion of the Jews, (for such is the allusion,) 
so the answer of the watchman is decidedly 
given, in reference to the same thing — " The 
morning cometh."" "Your scoffs," says the 
faithful watchman, " do not damp my hopes ; 



WHAT OF THE NIGHT ? 19 

your derision does not move me one inch 
from the strong ground of the sure and faith- 
ful promise on which I stand. God has said 
it, and my utterance is but the echo of the 
mind of God. The Jews will be restored; 
improbable as it may appear, it is notwith- 
standing absolutely certain." In order to 
confirm our faith in the statement of the 
prophet, I may here refer the reader to the 
60th and 61st chapters of Isaiah, which clearly 
describe the restoration of the JeAvs. These 
chapters directly relate to the Jews. We 
Gentiles act very hardly by these Jews. 
Every beautiful promise that we read in the 
Old Testament, we seize, and say, "That is 
for us Gentiles ;" and of every threat of de- 
solation, judgment, and destruction, we say, 
u That is for you Jews." We take the kernel 
for ourselves, and give the shell to the poor 
Jews. We subtract from the prophecies every- 
thing that is bright and beautiful, and say, That 
is ours ; and then all that is dark and threat- 
ening we fling in scorn to the Jew ; and not 
only fling curses at him, but trample him under 
foot, and treat him as if he were the very 
offscouring of the earth, instead of being one 

c2 



20 WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 

of a people embosomed in glorious promises, 
with title-deeds, beside which those of the 
greatest men in the world are bnt of yester- 
day, and with an inheritance in reversion the 
most glorions that langnage can describe or 
heart conceive — an inheritance incorrnptible 
and undefiled, and that fadeth not away. Now 
I believe that the whole 60th chapter of Isaiah 
relates to the redemption of the Jews ; it is when 
speaking of Israel that he says, " Thy light is 
come," that is the fulfilment of what the watch- 
man says: "The morning corneth." "Arise, 
shine, for thy light is come, and the glory of 
the Lord is risen upon thee ; and the city had 
no need of the sun nor of the moon, for the 
glory of God, and of the Lamb, did lighten 
it." Now mark ver. 3, "And the Gentiles shall 
come to thy light, and kings to the brightness 
of thy rising/ 5 and, speaking to the Jews, "then 
shalt thou see and flow together, and thine 
heart shall fear and be enlarged; because the 
abundance of the sea shall be converted unto 
thee ; the forces of the Gentiles shall cover 
thee." And then at ver. 9, " Surely the isles 
shall wait for me, and the ships of Tarshish 
first, to bring thy sous from far, their silver 



WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 21 

and their gold with them, unto the name of 
the Lord thy God, and to the Holy One of 
Israel, because he hath glorified thee. And 
the sons of strangers shall build up thy walls/'' 
the walls of the city spoken of by Ezekiel, " and 
their kings shall minister unto thee ; for in 
my wrath I smote thee ; but in my favour 
have I had mercy on thee :" i. e. " the morn- 
ing cometh." " Therefore," he proceeds, " thy 
gates shall be open continually ; they shall not 
be shut day nor night." And then at ver. 19, 
" The sun shall be no more thy light by day, 
neither for brightness shall the moon give 
light unto thee : but the Lord shall be unto 
thee an everlasting light, and thy God thy 
glory. The sun shall no more go down, neither 
shall thy moon withdraw itself; for the Lord 
shall be thine everlasting light, and the days of 
thy mourning shall be ended. Thy people also 
shall be all righteous ; they shall inherit the 
land" — i. e. Palestine, the promised land — "for 
ever : the branch of my planting, the work of 
my hands, that I may be glorified." And again, 
in Isaiah lxii., you have the allusion to the 
watchman, " For Zion's sake I will not hold my 
peace, and for Jerusalem's sake I will not rest, 



22 WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 

till the righteousness thereof go forth as bright- 
ness, and the salvation thereof as a lamp that 
burnetii. And the Gentiles shall see thy righte- 
ousness, and all kings thy glory ; and thou shalt 
be called by a new name, which the mouth of 
the Lord shall name." " And this is the name 
of the city — the Lord is there." Then at verse 
6 : " I have set watchmen upon thy walls, O 
Jerusalem." Do not say, that belongs to us 
Gentiles ; you may give a spiritual application 
to that blessed truth to us ; but literally and 
strictly it belongs to the Jews. "I have set 
watchmen upon thy walls, O Jerusalem, which 
shall never hold their peace day nor night ; ye 
that make mention of the Lord, keep not silence; 
and give Him no rest till He establish, and till 
He make Jerusalem a praise in the earth." 
Do we pray for the Jews as we ought ? — do we 
labour for the conversion of the Jews as we 
ought ? I believe we do not. We do not do 
all we ought to do for the Gentiles; but we 
ought to do something for the Jews, if it were 
only for a testimony. I believe their conversion 
is yet future ; but our duty to the Jews is une- 
quivocal, and I fear that we Gentiles do not 
discharge that dutv. 



WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 23 

One other chapter I must quote : and I quote 
this chapter to show what to me is so blessed a 
discovery, the habit of looking at these Scrip- 
tures in their literal aspect. We are not to 
make the Scripture apiece of wax, to be twisted 
in any form our fancy may suggest, but just to 
look at God's word as God has given it, and to 
understand it literally, whenever we can. Turn, 
then, to Ezekiel xxxvii., and see what God says 
there of the restoration of the Jews : " The hand 
of the Lord was upon me, and carried me out 
in the Spirit of the Lord, and set me down in 
the midst of the valley which was full of bones." 
I may mention, before I proceed, that I doubt 
not that the reader has heard sermons on this 
passage, preaching the resurrection. Unques- 
tionably it does prove this, because the literal 
resurrection is the basis of this parable ; or he 
may have heard sermons explaining from it that 
man, in his natural state, is like ' ' a valley of 
dry bones ;** and this is perfectly legitimate : 
but if you will read the chapter as God plainly 
meant it, namely, to teach the first great lesson 
— the restoration of the Jews and their conver- 
sion — you will see how beautiful and how con- 
sistent it is. " And He caused me to pass by 



24) WHAT OF THE NIGHT ? 

them round about ; and behold, there were 
many in the open valley : and lo, they were very 
dry. And he said unto me, Can these bones 
live ? Just giving utterance to what the scoffing 
world would say — " Watchman, what of the 
night ?" " And I answered, O Lord God, thou 
knowest. Again he said unto me, Prophesy 
upon these bones, and say unto them, O ye dry 
bones, hear the word of the Lord. Thus saith 
the Lord God, Behold I will cause breath to 
enter into you, and ye shall live; and I will 
lay sinews upon you, and will bring flesh upon 
you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in 
you, and ye shall live : and ye shall know that 
I am the Lord. So I prophesied, as I was 
commanded ; and, as I prophesied, there was a 
noise: and behold, a shaking; and the bones 
came together, bone to his bone. And when 
I beheld, lo ! the sinews and the flesh came 
upon them," — a progressive change taking 
place, which I. will produce facts to show is 
now in the course of operation; "and the 
skin covered them above; but there was no 
breath in them." Perhaps this indicates their 
return to their own land, prior to their con- 
version, which I think may be the fact. 



WHAT OF THE NIGHT ? 25 

"Then he said unto me, Prophesy unto the 
wind/' or, as it might be translated, " spirit/' 
for it is the same word — "Prophesy, son of 
man, and say to the wind, Thus saith the Lord 
God, Come from the fonr winds, O breath ! 
and breathe npon these slain, that they may 
live. So I prophesied, as he commanded me; 
and the breath came into them, and they lived, 
and stood up npon their feet, an exceeding 
great army." And then comes the interpre- 
tation of the parable : " Then he said nnto me, 
Son of man, these bones are the whole honse 
of Israel, behold, they say our bones are 
dried, and our hope is lost : we are cut off fo 
our parts. Therefore prophesy, and say unto 
them, Thus saith the Lord God, Behold, O my 
people, I will open your graves, and cause you 
to come up out of your graves, and bring you 
into the land of Israel. And ye shall know 
that I am the Lord when I have opened your 
graves, O my people, and brought you out of 
your graves, and shall put my spirit in you, 
and ye shall live ; and I shall place you in your 
own land : then shall ye know that I the Lord 
have spoken it, and performed it, saith the Lord." 
And then, at verse 21, " Say unto them, Thus 



26 WHAT OF THE NIGHT ? 

saith the Lord God, Behold, I will take the 
children of Israel from among the heathen 
whither they be gone, and will gather them on 
every side, and bring them into their own land. 
And I will make them one nation in the land 
npon the mountains of Israel ; and one king 
shall be king to them all," — this seems to refer 
rather to the prince about whom we read than 
to the Messiah, — "and they shall be no more 
two nations, neither shall they be divided into 
two kingdoms any more at all. Neither shall 
they defile themselves any more with idols, nor 
with their detestable things, nor with any of 
th'eir transgressions; but I will save them out 
of all their dwelling-places wherein they have 
sinned, and will cleanse them. So they shall 
be my people, and I will be their God. And 
David my servant shall be king over them," — 
whether this be the Messiah or not, I am not 
prepared to say, — ce and they shall all have one 
shepherd ; they shall also walk in my statutes, 
and observe my judgments, and do them. And 
they shall dwell in the land which I have given 
co Jacob my servant, wherein your fathers have 
dwelt ; and they shall dwell therein, even they, 
and their children, and their children's children 



WHAT OF THE NIGHT ? 27 

for ever." And then, at verse 27, " My taber- 
nacle, also, shall be with them; yea, I will be 
their God, and they shall be my people. And 
the heathen shall know that I, the Lord, do 
sanctify Israel, when my sanctuary" — referring 
to the subsequent chapters in the same book — 
" shall be in the midst of them for evermore." 
Does not all this clearly and demonstrably 
refer to the restoration of the whole house of 
Israel? "The morning* cometh." This seems, 
first, to be the prophet speaking to the bones — 
" Prophesy to the bones ; " then the bones 
begin to move, then come the sinews and flesh 
— but still there is no life ; then the Spirit 
comes into them, and they live for ever. There 
must first of all then, be a shaking, or prelimi- 
nary movement, among this ancient people, be- 
fore their final restoration and glory. Such 
passages as these, for instance, show it : " And 
they shall remember me in the far countries ; " 
"and they shall live with their children, and 
turn again." And again, " They shall call upon 
my name, and I will hear them, and I will 
say, It is my people : " as if the first cry of 
the children of Israel, from the distant ends of 
the earth, instantly met the response of God : 



28 WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 

" Why ! there is my ancient people ! " just as 
the father said of his prodigal son : " He was 
dead, and is alive again, : he was lost, and is 
found." So, when Israel shall begin to cry to 
God for deliverance, He will instantly say, " This 
is my people." And he adds, " Thine ears shall 
hear a word behind thee, saying, This is the 
way, walk ye in it, when ye turn to the right 
hand, and when ye turn to the left." And, in 
the book of Zechariah, ii. 7, we have the follow- 
ing passage, " Ho, ho, come forth, and flee from 
the land of the north, saith the Lord; for I 
have spread you abroad as the four winds of the 
heaven, saith the Lord." " The land of the 
north" is always used in Scripture for the nor- 
thern parts of Europe. An ukase issued by 
the autocrat of all the Russias is this year just 
put into execution ; it orders the Jews to cease 
to be distinguished from the rest of his subjects 
by the peculiar dress which has been worn by 
them for the last five hundred years. The em- 
peror of Russia may make slaves, or he may 
make nobles, but he cannot make a Jew a Gen- 
tile. God has pronounced their insulation from 
the nations, and that they shall be a separate 
and distinct people from all others upon earth. 



WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 29 

Sir Moses Montefiore, a leader among the Jews 
in this country, has been visiting the emperor 
of Russia; he has been most graciously re- 
ceived, and the emperor has given full permis- 
sion to ten thousand Jews to go home, if they 
like, to Palestine. 

But it is farther said, in the same passage, 
" Deliver thyself, O Zion, O thou that dwellest 
with the daughter of Babylon." Babylon, as I 
have already observed, is the prophetic name 
for the great mystery of iniquity, the Roman 
apostasy. What has been the situation of the 
Jews in Rome for the last twelve hundred 
years ? They have been crowded together like 
swine, driven into a place called the Ghetto, 
and subjected to every hardship and suffering. 
When the pope disappeared, the Jews were 
emancipated from the Ghetto; they laboured 
night and day to prevent the return of the 
pope ; and they were seen reading to the 
modern Romans, 2 Thess. iii., representing one 
that sits in the temple of God, as if he were 
God, and they told the Romans, This is the 
very picture of your pope; you must not let 
him come back — you must keep him away at 
all hazards. Here was the Jew struggling for 



30 WHAT OF THE NIGHT ? 

emancipation, hearing from the depths of his 
ruin the accents of his God, " Deliver thyself, 
O Zion, that dwellest with the daughter of 
Babylon;" and every well-informed Jew will 
tell you that when Popery is destroyed, the 
Messiah will come, and they shall return to the 
land of their fathers. It has been very recently 
observed, that more Jews have been truly con- 
verted during the last ten or fifteen years than 
from the downfall of Jerusalem to the com- 
mencement of the present age. This is proved 
by the condition of Palestine at this moment. 
In the age of Constantine the Great, there 
were just five hundred Jews in Palestine. In 
the twelfth century, and after the Crusades, 
there were a thousand Jews in Palestine, and 
two hundred in Jerusalem. In 18-18, there 
were twenty thousand Jews in Palestine, and 
ten thousand in Jerusalem ; and the mixed 
population is diminishing every day; so that 
we cannot but say, indeed, " The morning 
cometh." 

A missionary from Constantinople writes that 
the Jews in that city are, at this moment, ac- 
tuated universally by an intense spirit of re- 
ligious inquiry ; and he says that he was in the 



WHAT OF THE NIGHT ? 31 

habit of always saying to an apparently very 
pious and devout Jew, " AYhen will the Messiah 
come?" And the answer he gave for a long 
time was, " The Messiah cometh:" but one 
day, instead of making his usual reply, the 
Jew said, ' ' The truth is, the Messiah is come ; 
and if you will show me a place of safety 
from the scimitar of the Moslem, I will show 
you ten thousand Jews ready to say that the 
Messiah is come, and that Jesus of Nazareth is 
that Messiah." Who knows but that, at this 
moment, there may be a Christian people among 
the Jews, just as there is a Protestant people in 
the very heart of the Church of Rorne, groaning 
under their bondage, but waiting for their de- 
liverence ? In Germany, multitudes of the Jews 
have cast off the Talmud, which is to the Jew 
what tradition is to the Roman Catholic. But, 
in Germany, many of the Jews have, during the 
the last few years, cast it off; and there is a syna- 
gogue in London where a Jew preaches without 
the Talmud, despising and rejecting it. And it 
is stated by the late Prussian ambassador at 
Rome, that there is a general movement of in- 
quiry among the Jews at this moment, and that 
something will take place to restore them very 



32 WHAT OF THE NIGHT ? 

speedily to the land of their fathers. The Rev. 
T. Griinshawe has stated that vast numbers of 
Jews are at this moment preparing to emigrate 
to Palestine; and Tholuck, the distinguished 
German divine, says that more Jews have been 
converted during the last fifty years than during 
the whole eighteen hundred that preceded them. 
It is also a very remarkable fact, that nearly all 
the newspapers of Germany are at present in 
the hands of Jews, and under their control; 
and I need not tell you that the gold of all 
Europe is so much in their hands that they can 
make a monetary crisis almost whenever they 
choose. Why have they all their property 
in a portable shape ? You do not find a Jew 
with property in land or in houses ; but he sits 
loose to the nations, in order that he may be 
ready to go at a moment's warning, and return 
to take possession of his own inheritance. You 
are constructing railroads id order to make 
money, and steamboats in order to make so 
much per cent. All this may be very proper 
and honourable ; but these will serve only to 
convey the Jew more speedily to his own land. 
Thus, while man is laying down rails in order 
to prosecute his own purposes, he is really 



WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 33 

making a highway for ancient Israel to come 
forth from their long and dreary exile, with all 
their money and portable property in their pos- 
session, and to return to their own land, there 
to rebuild their temple, and there to be con- 
verted by a Pentecost far more magnificent and 
glorious than even that first Pentecost which 
was so precious, and is so precious still. 

The reader, perhaps, doubts the truth of my 
statement, that the Jews are to be restored in 
their unconverted state, and then, after their 
restoration, to be converted to Christianity. 
One passage on which I ground this conclusion 
will be found in Zech. xii. 1 : " The burden of 
the word of the Lord for Israel, saith the Lord, 
which stretched forth the heavens, and layeth 
the foundation of the earth, and formeth the 
spirit of man within him. Behold, I will make 
.Jerusalem a cup of trembling unto all the 
people round about, when they shall be in the 
siege both against Judah and against Jerusa- 
lem." This seems to allude to that great battle 
which we learn from the Apocalypse is to be 
fought in the last days, called the Battle of 
Armageddon; and as far as we can gather, it 
points to Palestine as the field of that battle : 



34 WHAT OF THE NIGHT ? 

' ' Aud in that day will I make Jerusalem a bur- 
densome stone for all people : all that burden 
themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though 
all the people of the earth be gathered together 
against it." Then v. 8. — " He that is feeble 
among them at that day shall be as David ; 
and the house of David shall be as God, as 
the angel of the Lord before them." Then at 
ver. 10, after this description, which plainly 
contemplates the Jews restored to their land — 
comes the promise — " And I will pour upon the 
house of David, and upon the inhabitants of 
Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplica- 
tions : and they shall look upon me whom they 
have pierced, and they shall mourn for him as 
one mourneth for his only son ; and shall be in 
bitterness as one that is in bitterness for his 
first-born. In that day there shall be a great 
mourning in Jerusalem, as the mourning of 
Hadadrimmon in the valley of Megiddon. And 
the land shall mourn, every family apart" — 
denoting that the land shall be divided into 
parts, each tribe occupying its place — "the 
family of the house of David apart, and their 
wives apart ; the family of the house of Nathan 
apart, and their wives apart ; the family of the 



WHAT OF THE NIGHT ? 35 

house of Levi apart, and their wives apart \ the 
family of the house of Shimei apart, and their 
wives apart : all the families that remain, every 
family apart, and their wives apart/'' Such 
seems to me to he the mind of God upon this 
subject. 

I have thus explained what appears to me to 
be the meaning of the declaration of the watch- 
man, " The morning cometh " — the morning of 
the restoration of Israel. But I must notice, 
before I part with this portion of my subject, 
that whilst it is morning for the Jew, it will 
also be a blessed morning for the Gentile. It 
may be said, " You have been preaching comfort 
to the Jews :" so I have ; but in that comfort 
I have been preaching comfort to the Gentile 
also. What does the Apostle say, " For if the 
casting away of the Jews be the riches of the 
Gentiles, what shall the receiving of them be 
but life from the dead." I say, all have an 
interest in that morning. There are, as I have 
said, many bright signs significant of its ap- 
proach ; great prophetic epochs are coming to 
a close : warning sounds of the approach of the 
doom of Babylon resound already from sea to 
sea, and from the Tiber to the ends of the 

d2 



36 WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 

earth. We see, also, a forelight of the coming 
day, in a new sense of brotherhood beginning 
to come down upon all sections of our land, 
unprecedented in the history of our country. 
We see papers beginning to speak and write 
about the wrongs and sufferings of the poor ; 
we see great men coming down from their iso- 
lation, and visiting and ministering to the wants 
of the poor and needy ; and men are beginning, 
for the first time, to recognise the fact, that the 
Queen has a sister in the humblest cellar, and 
the greatest prince in our land has a brother in 
the poorest labourer. This beautiful, and deep, 
and growing sense of brotherhood, is an earnest 
and foretaste of that clay when the poor shall 
cease from the land, and all shall be rich, un- 
speakably rich, because unspeakably great. The 
65th and 67th psalms are psalms for the last 
days ; and what so delights one in singing these 
beautiful psalms is, the feeling that we are join- 
ing with the Jew, and that, while single, our 
joy is incomplete unless it be echoed from the 
voice and reflected from the countenance of 
that Jew. In these psalms one of the features 
of the last da^ s is thus described — " The earth 
shall vield her increase." What are the discus- 



WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 37 

sions that agitate rival and contending political 
parties, whose opinions and names I neither 
comprehend nor care to decide npon ? Whether 
it is possible to cultivate the earth more suc- 
cessfully — whether it is capable of producing 
more. The ancient prophecies of God are the 
modern problems of mankind. All these things 
are, under the control of God, leading to one 
great result — " the morning cometh." The first 
rays indicate the rise of the millennial sun. 

Each year on which we enter, let me also 
add, is a stage in that great procession. 1849 
passed away, dark with shadows and terrible 
disasters : 1850 has come, and unveiled a new 
Papal conspiracy; we hope that in 1851 the 
tops of Lebanon may be sprinkled with the first 
rays of the approaching sun, and the streams of 
Jordan reflect his first beams. Whether it shall 
be so or not, this we know, that the great chro- 
nological epochs which relate to the Jews are 
being crowded together and. concentrated in 
every day that now passes. It is the opinion 
of many that we are entering remarkable yeaiT. 
I read a statement in a paper which reflects 
the opinions and the sentiments of mankind, 
describing a subject in which I take no personzJ 



38 WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 

interest, viz. the preponderance of money in the 
Bank of England, which the Times said will 
make future years of wonders and miracles. It 
is, perhaps, like Balaanr's unconscious prophecy. 
The unconscious prophecies of the world are 
often its truest ones. It is not, however, for 
us to prophesy, but soberly to study the Word 
of God. And if we are the children of God — 
if we are Christians indeed, when the morning 
cometh how welcome will it be ! and if we shall 
not be spared through the days of one year to 
enter upon those of another, it will be but an- 
ticipating the promise, and giving us the morn- 
ing rays sooner than the rest of mankind. Come 
what may, if our hearts are in the right place — 
if our footing be on the Rock of ages, to us 
there cometh, and will come soon, a blessed, 
bright, and glorious morning. 

I have occupied so much space in delineating 
the morning — the bright side of the picture, 
that I have left myself too little, in the present 
chapter, for describing the night that cometh 
also, and the more practical duties that follow 
from it. 



CHAPTER II. 

THE MORNING COMETH, AND ALSO THE NIGHT. 

"Know well my soul, God's hand controls; 
Whate'er thou fearest ; 
Round him in calmest music rolls 
Whate'er thou hearest. 

"And that cloud itself, which now before thee 
Lies dark in view, 
Shall, with beams of light from the inner glory, 
Be stricken through." 

" The burden of Dumah. He calleth unto me out of Seir, 
Watchman, what of the night? Watchman, what of the 
night? The watchman said, The morning cometh, and 
also the night : if ye will enquire, enquire ye : return, 
come."- — Isaiah xxi. 11,1*2. 

In my former examination of the passage at 
the head of this chapter, I stated that Dumah 
is only another name for the land of Edom, or 
Idumea, — that the word burden is an expression 
used by the prophets, when they mean that they 
have a heavy or calamitous message to deliver, 
which weighs upon their hearts like lead, till 



40 THE MORNING COMETH. 

they unfold and make it known. It is, there- 
fore, the prophetic preface to predictions of 
judgment. I explained, also, the position that 
is here assumed : — First, it might be applied to 
the time of the Babylonish captivity, and with 
reference to the restoration of Judah after it. 
But it appears from the language employed in 
parallel passages, to which I have turned the 
attention of my reader at great length, that 
Edom is used simply as the type or foreshadow 
of the world, as Babylon is used repeatedly, 
and in the Apocalypse especially, as the fore- 
shadow or actual name of the great apostasy. 
I therefore suppose that the hour at which the 
question is asked is the hour that passes. The 
person who asks the question, calling out of 
Mount Seir — Seir being the capital of Idumea, 
or the mountain on which the chief city was 
built — seems to be some proud, and haughty, 
and worldly individual, indifferent to religion, 
and having neither studied it nor feeling dis- 
posed to do so ; who asks the watchman in 
scorn, " What of the night ?" This watchman, 
as I have explained, is supposed to be some 
solitary sympathiser with the ruin, and hoper 
in the restoration of Israel. He is looking for 



AND ALSO THE NIGHT. 41 

a day when that down-trodden people shall be 
restored — Avhen the exile of so many hundred 
years shall be ended, and they shall return to 
the land of their fathers, and inherit it in all its 
glory and renovated beauty and fertility. This 
watchman, looking for the restoration of the 
house of Israel, hears a scorner from some great 
capital say, " Watchman, what of the night ? 
You have long been looking for the prosperity 
of the Jew ; it is long in coming ; may it not 
be a delusion ? May you not be altogether 
mistaken in expecting such a thing ? And may 
we not be justified in still treading down the 
Jew, exacting from him all we can, — applying 
to him all the threats of the Bible, and taking 
to ourselves all the promises of the Bible V 
To this inquiry the watchman answers — " The 
morning cometh, and also the night. " I have 
explained what that morning is by parallel pas- 
sages, and proved, that while it may be applied, 
amongst other things, to the coming prosperity 
of the Church, it does mean, primarily, the 
morning of the restoration of Israel, and their 
conversion to the Saviour. 

But he adds : " And also the night cometh." 
On this clause I have not made any remarks in 



42 THE MORNING COMETH, 

tlie last chapter ; in this, therefore, I will en- 
deavour to illustrate what is meant by the ex- 
pression — " The night also cometh ; " and then 
I will proceed to consider the remainder of the 
verse — " If ye will enquire, enquire ye : return, 
come." Now, if we apply "night" to signify 
calamity to Edom, or Idumea, to which it pri- 
marily refers, we shall find that a night did 
come, and did overtake the whole land of 
Idumea; and that the most awful predictions 
embodied in the ancient prophets have been 
literally and strictly fulfilled in the history of 
that land. For instance we are told by the 
prophet Jeremiah (chapter xlix. 7), " Concern- 
ing Edom" — i. e. Idumea, or Dumah — " Thus 
saith the Lord of hosts : Is wisdom no more in 
Teman? is counsel perished from the prudent? 
is their wisdom vanished ? Flee ye ; turn back, 
dwell deep, O inhabitants of Dedan; for I will 
bring the calamity of Esau upon him, the time 
that I will visit him. If grape-gatherers come 
to thee, would they not leave some gleaning 
grapes ? If thieves by night, they will destroy 
till they have enough. But I have made Esau 
bare ; I have uncovered his secret places, and 
he shall not be able to hide himself: his seed 



AND ALSO THE NIGHT. 43 

is spoiled, and his brethren and his neighbours, 
and he is not." And then he proceeds : (t Thus 
saith the Lord, Behold, they whose judgment 
"was not to drink of the cup, have assuredly 
drunken ; and art thou he that shall altogether 
go unpunished ? Thou shalt not go unpunished, 
but thou shalt surely drink of it. For I have 
sworn by myself, saith the Lord, that Bozrah 
shall become a desolation, a reproach, a waste, 
and a curse ; and all the cities thereof shall be 
perpetual wastes/' Then at verse 15 : "I will 
make thee small among the heathen, and despised 
among men. Thy terribleness hath deceived 
thee, and the pride of thy heart, O thou that 
dwellest in the clefts of the rock, that holdest 
the height of the hill ■/' for Petra, the capital 
of Edom, was built on the solid rock, and its 
walls, and palaces, and tombs, were cut out of 
it. " Though thou shouldest make thy nest as 
high as the eagle, I will bring thee down from 
thence, saith the Lord. Also, Edom shall be 
a desolation : every one that goeth by it 
shall be astonished, and shall hiss at all the 
plagues thereof. As in the overthrow of 
Sodom and Gomorrah, and the neighbouring 
cities thereof, saith the Lord, no man shall 



44 THE MORXIXG COMETH, 

abide there., neither shall a son of man dwell 
in it." Almost the same prophecy, but, if 
possible, in stronger words, is found in Ezekiel 
xxv., to which I need not now refer at any 
greater length. 

The question then is, Has this night, thus 
graphically pour tray ed and predicted by Jere- 
miah, fallen upon Edom? Is there evidence 
in history that what God pronounced in pro- 
phecy has been literally fulfilled ? I beg atten- 
tion briefly to the evidence of it. I attach very 
great importance to this subject, on the ground 
that, if every prediction in the past that has 
been accomplished, not in the lump (if I may 
use the expression), but literally, exactly, letter 
for letter, prophecy and performance, we may 
reasonably infer that every prediction which 
relates to the future shall literally and strictly, 
prophecy and performance, be fulfilled too. 
Recollecting, then, the words I have read, hear 
the evidence of travellers, from whose writings 
I will read one or two very brief extracts. 
" Edom," we are told by the prophet, "is to 
lie desolate from generation to generation, and 
lie waste." Yolney, the infidel historian, de- 
scribes the modern Idumea as " having no place 



AND ALSO THE NIGHT. 45 

of habitation throughout the whole of it." 
Here was GocPs prophet, saying, " Edom shall 
lie waste :" here is Satan's prophet, for such 
Yolney was, a scoffing infidel (not an honest 
disbeliever), pronouncing, when he visits it, 
ignorant that he was declaring the fulfilment 
of prophecy, that it is just what God said that 
it should be. Burckhardt, another traveller, 
states that, " Idumea is a vast stony desert, 
overgrown with herbs, and plants of all sorts ; 
and yet it must have been once," he says, 
" thickly inhabited. Great must have been 
the opulence," he adds, " of a city which could 
produce such monuments as these, cut out of 
the solid rock." You will find in a volume of 
Dr. Keith's work on the fulfilment of pro- 
phecy, several engravings from daguerreotype 
and talbotype views taken on the spot, which 
will show how minutely prophecy has described 
the state of Edom, and how exactly it has been 
carried into effect. Another traveller, on visit- 
ing Idumea, says, "Nothing can exceed the 
desolation of the view from the summit of 
Mount Hor — 'a land of barrenness and ruin 
— a land accursed of God.' " 

Such is the dispassionate, disinterested tes- 



46 THE MORNING COMETH, 

tiinony of another traveller. Mausoleums, and 
palaces, and noble halls, are cut out of the solid 
rock, of gigantic dimensions, but now they are 
only the habitation of owls, and bats, and bit- 
terns, and wild beasts. And the recent Ameri- 
can traveller, Stephens, in his travels, which are 
extremely interesting, writes — it is true, as a 
Christian who is aware of the prophecy, but 
who was not the less likely, on that account, to 
be impartial in his description : — " I would that 
the sceptic could stand as I did among the ruins 
of the city, and amid rocks, and then open the 
sacred book and read the words of the inspired 
penman, written when this desolate place was 
one of the greatest cities of the world. I see 
the scoff arrested, the cheek pale, the lips 
quivering, and the heart quaking with fear, as 
the ruined city comes forth to him with a voice 
loud and powerful, as of one risen from the 
dead ; and though he would not believe Moses 
and the prophets, he believes the hand- writing 
of God in the ruins and desolation around him." 
So minutely has the whole prediction been 
fulfilled! I have quoted these passages in order 
to show that the night predicted has come upon 
Edom in all its blackness ; so that there is not 



AND ALSO THE NIGHT. 47 

one ray of light more than the prophet said there 
would be ; there is not one atom of desolation 
less than prophecy was burdened with. I add 
one more confirmatory remark on the literal 
and exact fulfilment of prophecy, by quoting 
the example of Nineveh. All of you must have 
read of the grandeur of that celebrated city, 
and of the terrible desolation which was pre- 
dicted to overtake it. Now many persons, when 
they read those fearful catalogues of the judg- 
ments of Nineveh, which are contained in tne 
Old Testament prophets, Ezekiel and Nahum, 
said, " In these days they had not the grandeur, 
the civilization that we have ; they had not the 
railroads, the steamboats, the ships, the magni- 
ficent architecture, the progress in science, the 
advancement in the arts of modern times : and 
no doubt the prophets spoke from their own 
ideas of a grandeur, which was at best very 
puny indeed." But Layard has discovered that 
that city was possessed of a grandeur and a 
magnificence so vast, that London placed beside 
it would look mean and pale. What may have 
been its internal wealth, or the extent of its 
commerce, w r e know not; but of its splendid 
architecture, of its vast grandeur, beauty, and 



48 THE MORNING COMETH, 

extent, as a mighty city, the prophets have given 
a description which has heen proved to the very 
letter; and thus it is seen that it was not 
" according to their own puny ideas of magni- 
ficence," but that they wrote according to fact, 
when they described the glory and the splen- 
dour of ancient Nineveh ; — while the same pro- 
phets who tell you of its then existing grandeur, 
tell you, in terms equally distinct, that all her 
pride should be utterly cast down and destroyed. 
It is declared by one prophet, that so great will 
be her desolation, that God says of her, " I will 
make thy grave." What has been the state of 
Nineveh for the last two thousand years? — 
Literally buried. What has Layard lately done ? 
— He has just opened its grave, and paid the 
wandering Arabs of the desert to aid him in 
raising this city, as it were, from the dead. 
Nahum says of this city, " She is empty, and 
void, and waste" (ii. 10.) "And it shall come 
to pass, that all they that look upon thee shall 
nee from thee, and say, Nineveh is laid waste : 
who will bemoan her ?" (hi. 7.) The poor Arabs 
and Bedouins, hired by Layard to come and 
assist him in his excavations said, " The place 
is haunted by spirits." They knew not whether 



AND ALSO THE NIGHT. 49 

he was a magician, " calling up spirits from the 
vasty deep/' or a mere money-maker, searching 
for hidden treasures; but they were terrified 
and fled. The prophet Zephaniah says, " He 
will stretch out his hand against the north, and 
destroy Assyria; and will make Nineveh a 
desolation, and dry, like a wilderness;" and, 
again, "Desolation shall be on the threshold 
of Nineveh/' Now hear what Layard says as 
a commentary on this prophecy: "The scene 
around is worthy of the ruin he is contemplat- 
ing. Desolation meets desolation : a feeling of 
awe succeeds to wonder, for there is nothing to 
relieve the mind, to lead to hope, or tell of what 
is gone by. These huge mounds of Assyria 
made a deeper impression on me, and gave rise 
to more serious thought and more earnest re- 
flection, than the temples of Baalbec or the 
theatres of Ionia." — Chap. i. p. 7. London, 1849. 
And he continues giving further descriptions, 
which would occupy too much space to give at 
length, showing that the minutest prediction 
contained in the Bible, concerning the fate of 
Nineveh, has met its complete fulfilment. How 
can you account for this? As Mr. Layard 
says, Nineveh had buildings as vast, as strong, 

E 



50 THE MORNING COMETH, 

as magnificent as Egypt ; Egypt is pronounced 
and predicted to become the basest of king- 
doms : " Slaves," we are told, " shall rule over 
her ;" and such is her state at this day ; but its 
monuments are still standing. Nineveh was 
predicted to be buried, with her monuments, 
in one vast grave. Mr. Layard has opened 
that grave. Depend upon it, the longer we live, 
the longer we shall see that that book called the 
Bible is the most wonderful phenomenon in the 
universe ; that there is nothing to be compared 
with it ; none but fools can scoff at it ; none 
but ignoramuses deny it; and the longer we 
read, and the more we know, the more we shall 
feel " God's word is truth." 

Looking, then, at these predictions of the 
night that were to come upon these nations, 
and having seen, in the cases I have cited, that 
threat fulfilled, I must now show that the same 
night, according to the measure of it that was 
to be meted out, has come upon other cities. 
M emphis, with its vast structures ; Thebes, with 
its hundred gates ; Palmyra, with all its glories, 
are at this moment shrouded by different por- 
tions of the great predicted night ; and they 
cry from the midst of that dense darkness which 



AND ALSO THE NIGHT. 51 

environs them, " The niglit has come npon us ; 
and it cometh npon you also V Assyria, and 
Persia, and Media, and Carthage, and Greece, 
and Rome, have been successively overwhelmed 
by the waves of barbarism ; and from the Dead 
Sea, in which they have found their tomb, they 
cry, " The night has come upon us ; and it 
cometh upon you also !" And have we not had 
recently, from 1848 to 1851, on the continent 
of Europe, some of the fringes of that night 
falling upon its great nations and great capitals ? 
What a night was that which we had, not many 
months ago, which fell, dark and dreary, first 
upon France, and then upon every country on 
the Continent ! — Kings were paralyzed — great 
statesmen were at their wits' end: dynasties 
that had rooted themselves for a thousand years, 
and twined their fibres, as it were, with the very 
structure of society, were torn up by the tem- 
pest, and swept away like Arab tents, or like 
houses of cards, till they had to be rebuilt from 
the very foundation ! And would that we could 
see now, from all that God's word says, that that 
night is past ! The morning, I believe, is very 
near : a morning more bright and beautiful than 
ever gilded the mountain tops ; but a night, 

e 2 



52 THE MORNING COMETH, 

dark, dreary, and calamitous, we are sure, will 
precede it. 

I have alluded to the present state of the 
continent of Europe, and here let me notice one 
source of its night. The schoolmasters in 
France are now generally teachers of Pantheism. 
They are specimens of what schoolmasters may 
become, if we do not take care that they are 
Christians also ; that they shall know and teach 
the Bible, as well as know and teach sec alar 
learning. The schoolmasters in France, it is 
now discovered, are teaching not only Panthe- 
ism, but Atheism and Socialism, of the vilest 
description, in almost every commune through- 
out the land ; so much so, that the Legislature 
has been obliged to interfere, and, if possible, to 
repress it. Germany overflows with Pantheism 
and Atheism at this very moment. Popery, I 
admit, is losing its foothold ; and it is the pro- 
bability, nay, it is my hope, that Popery and 
Pantheism will soon fight it out upon the stage 
of Europe, Satan thus becoming a house divided 
against itself, that the triumphs of the gospel 
may be hastened amid the chaos. And in the 
last days we are told that a night will come 
when the sun shall be darkened, and the moon 



AND ALSO THE NIGHT. 53 

shall not give her light ; the sea and the waves 
shall be roaring ; the stars shall fall from heaven, 
and great political powers shall be overthrown, 
and men's hearts shall fail them for fear of the 
things that are coming npon the earth. And 
St. Peter tells us, in his Second Epistle, that 
"the day of the Lord shall come as a thief in 
the night, in the which the heavens shall pass 
away with a great noise, and the elements shall 
melt with fervent heat ; the earth also, and the 
works that are therein, shall be burned up." 
That is the night ; then " the morning cometh :" 
"nevertheless, we, according to his promise, 
look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein 
dwelleth righteousness/' 

And, when looking at this night, which is 
coming on all the nations of the earth, what 
hopes, what feelings may we entertain concern- 
ing that which is so dear to us — our own native 
land ! I do believe that the judgments which 
have fallen on the continent of Europe have, 
in some degree, been blessed to us. I believe 
that we, as subjects, are more attached to our 
great institutions ; and that our rulers have 
been taught by recent judgments, less to depend 
upon the brute force of bayonets, more upon 



54 

moderation, upon goodness, justice, equity, loyal 
hearts, and a holy and sanctified population ; I 
believe, too, that the recent epidemic, which 
scourged us so severely, has been eminently and 
■widely sanctified. I hear it stated on all hands, 
that our churches and chapels are more crowded 
than they have been known to be within the 
memory of man. I hear from all sources, that 
there is spreading amongst us a deep and in- 
satiable thirst for something that will stand 
man in stead, if so terrible an epidemic should 
visit us again. We know the fact, that the 
great extremes of society — poverty and wealth 
— have been pressed together by recent judg- 
ments, and that a deeper and a nobler sense of 
brotherhood has been diffused among all the 
branches of our population ; and that this great 
country of ours — great, notwithstanding all its 
faults, its imperfections, and its shortcomings — 
is beginning to assume what Milton said it 
ought ever to assume — the precedence of teach- 
ing the nations of the earth how to live. May 
we not, then, venture to hope that those funeral 
bells which have been tolling the crash of 
thrones, the downfall of dynasties, the requiem 
of great nations, are about to change their notes 



AND ALSO THE NIGHT. 55 

to British ears, and to ring out a marriage peal, 
announcing that blessed day when the first 
and the last and the best tone shall be, ' { The 
marriage of the Lamb is come, and his bride 
hath made herself ready V 

Now, in uttering such hopes, and in speaking 
upon such topics, I cannot but allude occasion- 
ally to social and political events ; and I think 
it is right that I should allude to them. I do 
feel that it is not enough to furnish theological 
essays. It is my duty — it is my privilege, to 
try, not out of my own wisdom, but from God's 
own Word, to give living direction, and to bring 
forth things new, provided they be true, as well 
as old. Now, I am told by mercantile men 
that there is a prospect of what they call a 
" surplus of money," when men will no longer 
be able to obtain the same amount of interest 
for their money which they used to get, and 
that the mercantile world is frightened lest 
there be coming upon it some terrible crisis. 
Now, my dear reader, excuse me if I call upon 
you to be on your guard ; remember, that making 
haste to be rich, if you miss your object, is 
making haste to ruin. Remember, that in pro- 
portion to the chance — to use your own phrase- 



ology — of a great fortune, is the cliance of total 
and irretrievable ruin. Let me give you old- 
fashioned prescriptions — and depend upon it 
they are old only because we ; in our ignorance, 
think that they are so — " Be patient ;" " Be 
content with such things as ye have;" "Let 
your moderation be known unto all men." It 
may be that our worst trial is coming ; it may 
be that our commercial depression was nothing 
— that the failure of our harvest was nothing — 
that the epidemic was nothing : it may be that 
our sorest trial will be this surplus of money in 
the money market. We can hold pretty steadily 
the half- full cup ; the full cup it is very difficult 
to hold steadily. The man who wraps his 
mantle tightly round him in the storm, lets it 
go when the sun begins to shine; never is a 
church or a nation in so great peril as when 
Satan shows either of them all the wealth and 
kingdoms of the world and says, "All these 
will I give you, if you will fall down and wor- 
ship me." " Watch," therefore, " and pray;" 
" Let your moderation be known unto all men:" 
" Having food and raiment, be therewith con- 
tent." God may be about to visit us by a new 
trial. Let us seek His grace, and His strength, 



AND ALSO THE NIGHT. 57 

to enable us to pass through it. Let us re- 
member that "the morning cometh, and the 
night too." Let us be patient in the one ; let 
us hope for joy and blessings in the other. 

Let me now say to those who scoff like him 
who called from Mount Seir, "Watchman, what 
of the night?" — who are too much in the world 
and of the world to think anything about re- 
ligion — to those who live simply to get rich — 
who, like Gallio, "care for none of those things," 
— " The night cometh." And it will be to you 
an awful, a terrible, an endless night — a night 
whose first twilight will reveal to you the dread- 
ful truth, " The harvest is past, the summer is 
ended, and we are not saved." To every branch 
of Church and State there cometh a night 
before there cometh a morning. There is a 
very solemn announcement made by St. Peter, 
that "judgment always begins at the house of 
God." Whenever yon see great schisms in 
churches, great apostasies, great defections, 
great corruption of doctrine, — you see judg- 
ment beginning at the house of God, which 
will fall with more consuming fury upon the 
world around. If, then, the Church of this 
land — and I use the word " Church" not in its 



58 THE MORNING COMETH, 

limited, but in its catholic sense, as embracing 
all Christians who hold the Head, Christ, and 
cleave to God's blessed Word — if the Church 
of our country shall give heed to other lights 
than the Sun of Righteousness, — if its leaves 
shall not be for the healing, but for the poison- 
ing of the nations of the earth, — if hers shall 
not be the fruits of the Spirit, but the apples 
of Sodom, all beauty outside, but all corruption 
and rottenness within, — if her members shall 
learn to seek their nourishment in holy water, 
in baptismal regeneration, and apostolical suc- 
cession, and such like figments and heresies, 
that ought to have been exploded long ago, — if 
the soil on which she shall grow be the susten- 
tation fund, or money on the voluntary prin- 
ciple, or Acts of Parliament — then the result 
will be that she will become like one of those 
old trees that we meet with sometimes in our 
country, where the sap is dried, the wood is 
decayed, while the bark alone stands, and rep- 
tiles and all venomous creatures grow and breed 
amid its recesses : she will be like that tree, 
incapable of bringing forth and putting out 
leaves, only tit to be cut down as a cumberer 
of the ground. But let the Church of the Lord 



AND ALSO THE NIGHT. 59 

Jesus Christ cease to quarrel, sect with sect, — 
let her rule and standard be the Word of God, 
let her light be the beams of the Sun of Right- 
eousness, — let the air in which her branches 
wave be the pure air of heaven, — let every 
church shed its dead leaves, and cut off and cast 
away its dead branches, and seek new life and 
new vigour, and put forth new buds, — and that 
church will stand and nourish, and spread its 
boughs from the river to the ends of the earth. 
A night may come upon her that will strip her 
of all her walls, her defences, and her battle- 
ments ; but life is within her — the vitality that 
God gives and that God keeps, and that nothing 
shall be able to exhaust or to destroy. We 
must look less on the things that are seen, and 
more on the things that are unseen ; our hope 
must be in the purity, the efficiency, the spiritu- 
ality of the church: for the days are coming when 
it must be founded on nothing else whatever. 

But to individuals, as well as to nations and 
churches there cometh a night — a night which 
is alluded to and intimated a thousand times — 
the sure night of death ; when the shadow that 
now darkens the threshold shall cross it no 
more, and the well-known countenance shall be 



60 THE MORNING COMETH., 

gazed upon no more. The night is coming; 
the day is drawing to a close; there will be 
space for no more work ; the body will wait in 
the tomb for the dawn of the resurrection-morn, 
and the soul will be in happiness before God. 

Such, then, are the different significations, 
or rather the different applications, of the night 
that cometh. The prophet concludes with these 
words, ' ' If ye will enquire, enquire ye : return, 
come." Enquire, " What shall it profit a man 
if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his 
own soul ?" Enquire, " What must I do to be 
saved ?" Enquire, " What think ye of Christ?" 
Enquire the way to heaven, with your faces 
thitherward. These are important enquiries, as 
important as any enquiries you can institute, 
and worthy of research as much as the ruins of 
Nineveh, the structure of the earth or of the 
sea, or the distance and the density of the 
planets of our system. And you are not left 
without the elements of such enquiry. There 
is a book called the Bible — it is the inspiration 
of God — it is His Word. Are its prophecies 
mere dreams ? Are its promises charming de- 
lusions ? or, Are they " yea and amen in Christ 
Jesus ?" Enquire ye. Enquire whence this 



AND ALSO THE NIGHT. 61 

book is, and enquire what this book is. Deal 
with it most severely ; treat the claims of the 
Bible with the most rigid, unswerving severity. 
It is a matter of such importance, that you 
must be satisfied with nothing less than the 
clearest and the most conclusive evidence. In- 
terrogate all history, investigate all its contents, 
and enquire, ask yourselves if every man spake 
like this Man? Enquire whence this book is, 
whose word the winds and the waves of preju- 
dice and passion no sooner hear than they 
instantly obey. "If ye will enquire, enquire 
ye." And more than that. — You who profess 
to receive this book, you who accept this reli- 
gion, let me ask, What is Christianity to you ? 
Is it anything more to you than baptism? 
What has it done for you ? Pray enquire, Has 
it merely given you a name in baptism ? — is 
that all ? Has it only given you a seat at the 
communion table ? — is that all ? Has it only 
made you a Christian by profession ? Are you 
children of the day, or children of the night ? 
Are you living branches of the living Vine, or 
fragments glued on by outward profession ? Is 
your footing on the Rock? Is your title the 
Lord's finished righteousness? Are you born 



62 THE MORNLNG COMETH, 

again? It is not applicable only to penal 
settlements, and gaols, and penitentiaries, " Ex- 
cept a man be born again, lie cannot see the 
kingdom of God : " — it is true of the greatest, 
the richest, the noblest, the best, — " Except ye 
be born again," yon may be everything else, 
but "Except ye be born again ye cannot see 
the kingdom of God." " Search the Scrip- 
tures '" examine these things ; enquire if these 
things be so or not. The disbeliever will be 
condemned, not for his scepticism, but because 
he never used the means of getting rid of that 
scepticism. Let us ask ourselves whether we 
have ever spent as much time in reading the 
evidences of Christianity as we have in examin- 
ing the petal of a flower, the history of a tree, 
the crystallisation of a mineral. Have we ever 
really sat down deliberately determined to come 
to the conclusion that this is God's book, or 
Satan's lie? There cannot be anything be- 
tween : and no man is consistent unless he 
either rejects the Bible as an impudent and 
atrocious imposture, or loves and lives the Bible 
as the very word of God himself. To you, 
B-eader, I say, "Enquire." 

But the prophet says too, what I say, Beader, 



AND ALSO THE NIGHT. 63 

to you, " Return." He supposes, naturally and 
beautifully, that enquiry will always lead to 
conviction. So it ever lias done, and so it ever 
will : and, assuming that the result of the pre- 
vious enquiry will be this step, which is a grand 
step, though not all that is required — the con- 
viction that God's book is true, then the next 
step is, " Return." If you have gone astray, 
"Return." If you are in the prodigal's land, 
say, " I will arise and go to this Father, whom 
this book makes known." If you have gone 
astray, say, as the prophet said of old, "Take 
away our iniquity, and receive us graciously. 
Asshur shall not save us : we will not ride upon 
horses, neither will we say any more to the 
work of our hands, Ye are our gods; for in 
thee the fatherless findeth mercy." And then 
the Lord will answer, " I will heal their back- 
sliding ; I will love them freely ; for mine anger 
is turned away." Then let us retrace our step. ; 
redeem the time ; be reconciled to God. If the 
result of our enquiry be, that this book is true, 
that this is God's book, then let us "return" — 
from darkness to light, from apostasy to truth, 
from infidelity to Christianity ; from th it rest- 
lessness, and disquiet, and uneasiness of con- 



64 THE MORNING COMETH, 

science, which will not let one say, "Christianity 
is true," because that would necessitate the 
banishment of sins in which so many now in- 
dulge. Let us leave that restlessness and dis- 
quiet which is neither the peace of the world 
nor the peace of God, and return to Him from 
whom Ave have gone astray. 

And then, says the prophet, adding another 
word, not only " return," but " come." This is 
the old sound of the blessed gospel : " Come 
unto me, all ye that are weary with your re- 
searches; all ye that are worn out with the 
world's cares, and the world's dissatisfaction, 
and I will give you rest." " Him that cometh 
unto me, I will in no wise cast out." Manas- 
seh, and David, and Saul, and the gaoler of 
Philippi, came, and were accepted. We have 
nothing to prepare as a title, — nothing to do as 
desert, but to come just as we are. We have 
enquired and found there is a Saviour ; we 
desire to return from the error of our ways ; 
and to meet with acceptance before God. All 
things are ready. Salvation is not waiting till 
some miracle is wrought before we come ; nor 
till we have made ourselves different from what 
we are now ; — it is instant closing with Christ ; 



AND ALSO THE NIGHT. 65 

first, for his forgiveness, as our Priest ; next, 
for his teaching as our Prophet; lastly, for 
peace, accounting Him as our complete and 
accomplished righteousness, as our great God, 
our Sovereign, and gracious Ruler. 

Who are they that are truly happy ? — the 
people that have despised the Bible, and rejected 
it, without enquiry, or they who have enquired, 
returned, and come ? All history will tell you, 
the latter. And when we come, as we must 
come, to that period when the night of time 
shall end, and the light of eternity shall burst 
upon us, how dreadful if that light shall be 
discovered, when it is too late to return or re^ 
trace our steps, to be the reflection of the flame 
that is never quenched ! but how joyous if the 
first beams that break upon the soul, as it 
emerges from the the body in which it lias so 
long tabernacled, be the rising rays of that 
Sun under whose wings we have found shelter 
now and in whose rays we shall live for ever and 
ever! 



CHAPTER III. 

EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 

" Jerusalem, my happy home — 

Name ever dear to me 
When shall my labours have an end, 

In joy, and peace, and thee \ " 

41 Arise ye, and depart; for this is not your rest." — Micah ii. 10. 

In words that have found an echo in every 
heart, and are implied in every chapter of the 
Bible — this world, even in its sunniest spots — 
in its loftiest, its most favoured, and most 
sheltered positions, "is not your rest ;" that is, 
it cannot satisfy that great soul that constitutes 
the man — it cannot meet its deep wants — it 
cannot lay its strong instinctive yearnings — or 
constitute that foundation on which we can 
repose with conscious security, and say, " Here 
I am satisfied, and here I will rest." It is my 
object in these remarks to show that the rest 



EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 67 

of the soul is not in this dispensation. God 
himself tells us this world is not our rest. He 
says : " Set your affection upon things above/'' 
" Lay not up for yourselves treasures which 
moth and rust may consume, and thieves break 
through and steal." " Labour not (that is, not 
so much) for the meat that perisheth, but for 
that which endureth unto everlasting life." He 
tells us again that here we have no continuing 
city, nor place of abode. God saw that man's 
tendency would be to glue his affections con- 
stantly to the world; and therefore He has 
made it the tendency of his providence to de- 
tach the affections of his own from the world, 
on which, if they be fixed, the soul that so fixes 
them shall perish with the world. All the repre- 
sentations given us of this world, and of our 
state in it, are fitted to help us to see it is not 
our rest. It is represented as a journey : men 
usually long to get over a journey, and to be at 
home. It is described, again, as a battle ; men 
usually desire that the battle should be finished, 
that the laurels may be worn. It is illustrated 
by a voyage : and we desire that the tempest 
may soon cease to whistle in our ears, and the 
waves to toss us, and that we may reach the 

f2 



68 EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 

quiet and sheltered haven. The sailor feels no 
home on the restless deep ! the soldier has no 
sense of home amid the clarion and the trumpet, 
and the sounds of battle. The creation itself 
is too poor to enrich man : the universe is too 
small to fill the capacities of man's great soul. 
We were made for something' greater, richer — - 
more glorious than the sun, and moon, and 
stars, and earth, and all things created ; for the 
vast and beauteous world was made for us, not 
we for the world. What is the natural course 
and pursuit of every unconverted man ? He is 
seeking rest somewhere. Like the dove, he has 
gone forth from the ark, and he wants to get 
some foot-hold in the heights or in the depths, 
in sunshine or in shadow, on the land or amid 
the seas, where he can find perfect rest; but, 
from Soloman to Socrates, and from Socrates 
to Alexander, and from Alexander to Napoleon, 
and from Napoleon till now, no spot has been 
found in the height or in the depth, where he 
can say — " Now I am satisfied." 

Man has tried all things in succession : the 
soul has set its desires upon wealth; it has 
resolved to realise a fortune. Sometimes it 
succeeds — a great fortune is made ; but there 



EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 69 

is heard, in piercing disappointment, from the 
very treasures it has accumulated, " Whoso 
drinketh of these waters shall thirst again." 
(< I take wings (says Riches) and fly away ; and 
if I remain, God will give you wings and take 
you away." Man's soul has set its heart upon 
pleasure : it has given license and reign to every 
sensual appetite and indulgence ; but what has 
been the result ? He has only increased the 
fever that he tried to allay ; he has drunk of 
the cup, and found it most sweet, till he came 
to the bottom, where he discovered there were 
dregs there so bitter as to make the whole 
nauseous and distasteful. The soul has some- 
times set its heart upon fame : it has sought to 
be echoed throughout the wide world, — though 
a more pitiable spectacle is not to be found on 
earth, than a man seeking after great fame; 
who searches every column of the newspaper to 
see if he can find a paragraph that will praise 
him; who looks into every man's face for a 
smile of approval ; who listens to every trumpet, 
whether royal or plebeian, if he can but catch 
the sound of his own name amid its notes. 
Poor man ! he is seeking honour from shame, 
dignity from degradation, glory from the very 



70 EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 

dust on which he treads ! There is no rest 
here. The soul has fixed its heart, perhaps, 
upon great elevation : it has sought to be raised 
to some lofty pinnacle ; to sit and enjoy itself, 
as it were, under the shadow of some Imperial 
throne. The despot of whom we read in Daniel, 
teaches us a modern sentiment, by an old 
example : — 

" Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown ! " 

The events of the east few years teach us 
that the turrets and pinnacles of the social 
fabric are first struck down by the lightning, 
or upheaved by the explosive earthquake that 
breaks forth beneath them. And a great king, 
one who had loyal subjects — who had much 
wealth, who had upon his countenance what 
crowns cannot give — the sunshine of the favour 
of his God — felt a throne to be so unsatisfactory, 
and all its pomp and splendour so unsuitable to 
the great wants of the great soul that sat upon 
that throne, that that monarch prayed — " O that 
I (monarch as I am) had wings, that I might 
flee away and be at rest \" 

These, then, are just the mistaken struggles 
of man's soul to find rest. Often have I no- 



EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 71 

ticed this — and the longer I think of it, the 
more am I impressed with its truth — that it is 
the evidence of the fall of man's soul that it 
seeks satisfaction from anything created; but 
it is the evidence of its aboriginal grandeur, 
that it never can get satisfaction from anything 
created. Until it find the true rest, it feels 
itself an exile wandering in the desert, enter- 
ing successive tents, fancying at each it has 
found a home, till the wind blows each away 
in succession, or the storm rends them all to 
pieces. The soul of man, parched with thirst, 
seeks for some stream it thinks its sees spark- 
ling in the distance : it eagerly pursues it ; 
weary and exhausted, it comes to it, but finds 
it only the mirage — the burning sunbeams re- 
flected from the burning sand ; the aggravation 
of its thirst, and the paralysis of effort ! Naked, 
the soul wants to be clothed, as Eve and Adam 
desired in Paradise. It has not found that 
raiment which alone is white and clean — that 
righteousness which can alone clothe it ; but it 
lays hold on the nearest raiment, even if it 
should be rags, or the fig-tree leaves, rather 
than remain naked. Torn from its centre, its 
only fountain, God, it yearns and longs for 



72 EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 

satisfaction, but cannot taste it. It finds its 
fountains to be cisterns, and its cisterns to be 
broken cisterns, that will hold no water. 

All this is but a commentary on the truth 
that was uttered no less than two thousand 
years ago, that neither this world, nor anything 
that is in it, is our rest; and here, may I not 
intimate, as I pass, what this teaches ? If this 
be the universal experiment, and if these be 
the universal results, should we not think of 
looking above the world for something better? 
Should we not try to rise above all that is seen, 
and thirst for that living water which God has 
promised, and which alone can remove the 
aching void, satisfy the parched thirst, and 
give that peace to the soul which passeth all 
understanding ? 

God teaches this truth — to his people, and 
to all who will hear, by his own dispensations. 
Those on whom you leaned, and to whom you 
looked up — whose shadows did not darken, but 
lighten your threshold and your fireside, — are 
taken away ; as if to tell you that the scenes 
you thought perpetual were but dissolving views; 
that the flowers that grew so beautifully in your 
garden, and that you thought would bloom and 



EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 73 

yield their fragrance in winter as well as in 
summer, must all be rooted up, or be turned to 
corruption and decay. Change, vicissitude, en- 
countered every day, and in all circles; fears 
within and fightings without; wearisome days 
and yet more wearisome nights ; the aching 
head — the restless invalid — his thankful look 
for your patient ministry; the delight felt by 
her that ministers at being able to mitigate his 
sufferings ; — all these things teach us we are in 
a world of sin, of vicissitude, uncertainty, and 
change ; and that it is not, it cannot be, a rest 
for that soul that covets and was made for the v^ 
infinite and eternal. 

God teaches us the very same lesson, by the 
success that attends our exertions. As long as 
we see wealth dazzling in the distance, we think 
if we could only reach it, how happy Ave should 
be ; but as soon as we are successful in the pur- 
suit, and possess the wealth, we find we have 
exaggerated its splendour. We think, when we 
see a rich equipage, how easy, and comfortable, 
and delightful it would be, if that carriage were 
ours ! We attain it ; and it feels to us, as soon 
as we are accustomed to its use, not one whit 
easie 1 : or better than the most ordinary vehicle 



74 EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 

that we had before. In fact, we find that pos- 
session takes away one-half of the charm of 
that which we so thirst and long for. The 
brilliant promise ends in very poor performance. 
Have yon not found, if I address any one who 
has been prosperous in the world, that the 
trouble of keeping money is almost greater 
than the care of earning it ? God would teach 
us by our success what we fail to learn by our 
failure, that there is nothing in the world that 
can satisfy man's soul, and give it rest. Who 
has not felt it far less easy to sit on a lofty 
pinnacle than on a very humble and lowly seat? 
Is it not the experience of the most successful 
amongst us, that passions are quenched by in- 
dulgence — that the gilding of the world's toys 
wears off soon after we have used them — and 
that the sound of flattery, which, in the dis- 
tance, was so musical, and the tones of which 
we were so anxious to catch, becomes hackneyed 
and wearisome by repetition? Neither in the 
height nor in the depth, neither in wealth nor 
in poverty, is there anything that can be a rest, 
and stay, and satisfaction to man's growing and 
unsatisfied soul. 

But we learn the very same lesson by the 



EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 75 

experience of others. Ask Ahab, and he will tell 
you, that, though he had a kingdom, he could 
not be satisfied without NabotVs vineyard. 
Ask Alexander, and if he could speak, he 
would tell you that, though he had conquered 
the world, he could not be satisfied unless he 
could be moved into another world, in order to 
conquer it. Ask those who have risen to the 
highest position of social life, and they will tell 
you, that they are not one whit happier than 
when they were in lower stations. I am in- 
clined to think, that the man who works hard 
for his daily bread, and gets it, and owes no 
man anything, is happier than the greatest man 
who has inherited a splendid fortune, and does 
not well know how to make use of it. Ask, 
then, I say, Riches, if they can make you happy; 
and if Riches speak honestly — if Mammon will 
speak truth, he will tell you — " I am clay, I am 
thorns ; I take wings and fly away ; and, if I 
stop, you will get wings and be taken away from 
me." Ask renown, ask rank, ask power ; and, 
if they speak honestly, they will tell you that 
the higher the elevation, the broader is the 
shadow. You will find the lower grade unsa- 
tisfied, ever treading on the heels of the upper ; 



76 EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 

that the servant wants always to be a master ; 
the master, when he is made so, always to be 
rich; and, when rich, he wants still to be 
honoured by some dignified title; never satis- 
fied ; ever looking for the satisfaction which is 
not to be found in anything we have, or in any- 
thing we can possess. Sages have lent all their 
wits to discover this mysterious spring of satis- 
faction, and they have failed ; poets have strung 
their lyres with their hearts' strings, if perad- 
venture they could sing it, and they have failed; 
and the universal experience is — rest is an exo- 
tic : it is not an indigenous plant ; it does not 
grow in this cold and wintry climate, or on this 
dry and barren sand; — it is the fruit of the 
tree of life. It is to be had, but in a way that 
I will afterwards point out, — in the earnest of 
it now, in its full realization hereafter. 

But we have also the testimony of our own 
reason, that this world, with all that it contains, 
cannot be a rest to man. Reason alone may 
show you, that the transient never can minister 
satisfaction to the eternal. That which can 
last for two days only, cannot be permanent 
sustenance for me. That which, however good, 
can accompany me a little way, cannot suffice 



EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 77 

me for all my journey. Reason itself will show 
you, that the material world never can come 
close enough into contact with the immaterial 
soul, and so must fail to give that soul the 
repose and satisfaction that it needs. In short, 
reason intimates, that there can be no rest till 
the mind is emancipated from its shadows ; till 
"the heart is dispossessed of its demoniacal 
passions ; till the conscience is relieved from 
random laws, and handed over to the sway of 
the great Legislator, and feels within it, erected 
in all its sovereignty, the kingdom of right and 
wrong. The soul always outgrows everything 
that it gets. As sure as a boy will outgrow the 
clothes that he wears, so sure Avill man's soul 
outgrow everything that it now has. Who does 
not feel, if he watches his own soul, that his 
mind is growing ? However defective my own 
mind may be — however weak, I am perfectly 
conscious that it grows. I could not preach 
to-day the sermons that I preached five or six 
years ago ; I should be ashamed of too many 
of them. I feel growth, progress, development 
in mind, as well as, I trust, in heart and in 
grace. If any one will watch his own mind, 
he will see that the things that seemed very 



7o EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 

grand a few years ago, appear very childish 
now; that the soul, in short, is in no respect 
like the body. The body, at the age of twenty- 
five or twenty- six, becomes stationary — has 
reached its growth ; but the soul has no culmi- 
nating point but the throne of God. The orbit 
of the soul vaults from the earth into the 
heights of the sky, and an angel's wing cannot 
follow it : it defies our pursuit — it sweeps far 
beyond our range ; it is the greatest thing upon 
the earth except God ; there is nothing higher, 
nothing nobler. 

But not only does reason teach us that there 
cannot be rest for the soul here; but those fore- 
tastes that God frequently gives his people upon 
earth — his own people, I mean — those who are 
truly converted — are to us evidences that this 
world is not our rest. If you are Christians, 
there are moments when, you cannot tell why, 
the heart dilates and throbs, as it were, under 
the touch of the paternal hand of God. There are 
times, you know, when there is a calm, a peace, 
a repose that the world cannot give, and the 
world cannot take away. What is this? Just 
what the Bible calls the earnest of our inheri- 
tance — the dawn of glory. Heaven is not an 



EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 79 

ultimate state into which man is pitched; but 
the maturer, brighter, fuller development of that 
state which has begun in the individual heart. 
If heaven do not begin in your heart, you have no 
reason to expect that you will ever be in heaven. 
It is a thing within us before it is a thing without 
us. Joy first enters into us ; then, afterwards, 
we enter into joy. Now, these foretastes or 
earnests of happiness, that God gives his people 
here below, are evidences that this is not our 
rest. They are, if I may so speak, a few flowers, 
retaining their Eden fragrance and their prime- 
val beauty, gathered from the paradise of God, 
and transmitted to his people upon earth ; that, 
smelling that fragrance which God's breath has 
given them, and gazing upon those tints which 
God's smile has shed on them, they may long 
for an abundant entrance into that heavenly 
inheritance. The happiness that God's people 
feel on such occasions, consists of, if I may so 
speak, a few snatches of heavenly harmonies 
vouchsafed to mortal ear, in order that they 
may long for that time when they shall join in 
the eternal jubilee. It is a momentary glimpse 
of glory — the lifting of the curtain for a minute 
— permission to the soul to see beyond that 



80 EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 

curtain, those hours which, like the hours upon 
the sun-dial, are measured by sunshine, and of 
which there shall never, throughout eternity, 
he an end. Such moments are the cluster of 
grapes which the children of Israel saw — earn- 
ests and pledges of the riches, the fulness, and 
fertility, of that promised land into which they 

s/- are marching. 

... This world was not meant, in any sense, to be 
our rest. God tells us it is the nursery in which 
the heirs of God are trained — the gymnasium 
in which our moral and spiritual powers are 
developed — the battle-field on which, as Christ's 
soldiers, we fight for victory ; and to take it for 
a rest is to mistake it altogether, for it was 
never meant to be so. 

^j This world is not fit to be our rest. Every- 
thing upon it, as I have already intimated, tilts 
and changes. Its pleasures, like the waves of 
the sea, are in perpetual flux and reflux, ebbing 
and flowing. The tears of to-day and the 
smiles of to-morrow — the joy of the morning 
and the sorrow of the night, are its constant 
interchanges. What is all this? a proof that 
earth is not fitted for our rest. The secret of 
the restlessness of man's soul, and the restless- 



EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 81 

ness of all without it, is sin. How is Satan 
described? "The devil goeth about." Why 
does he go about? Because he is restless. Why 
is he restless? Because sin governs, agitates, 
and fevers him perpetually. Now our souls are 
more or less tainted; the world on which we 
move is tainted; sin has fevered it, and filled 
the mind with darkness, the conscience with 
uneasiness, the heart with disquiet. Sin has 
so wn the earth with thorns, sprinkled it with 
tears, scarred and mutilated it with graves ; so 
much so that, to use the language of the 
apostle, " the earth groans and travails in pain, 
waiting to be delivered; as if he would repre- 
sent the earth as a mother crying and weeping 
in her agony for her offspring, listening to the 
sobs of her children that she cannot help ; and 
longing, ere she receives successive generations 
of the dead into her bosom, for that blessed day 
when there shall be the "manifestation of the 
sons of God," and all creation shall lay aside 
her ashen robes and put on her Easter garments, 
and the world shall end, as the world began, 
with Eden. This world, as it now is, then, is y 
not fit to be our rest. 

In the next place, which is no less decisive, 

G 



82- EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 

death tells us every moment that this world is 
not our rest. Death is a message to those that 
we have lost, but a missionary to those that 
remain ; and that missionary preaches clearly 
and distinctly, ever as he breaks our circle — 
makes gaps in our homes — takes away those on 
whom we looked with sympathy — bears away 
those whom we would have retained in our 
bosoms — that this world — that happy home — 
that brig! it circle — that holy brotherhood — 
beautiful and blessed as they may be, are none 
of them the rest that awaits the people of God. 
</\ Our own personal experience teaches us this. 
I ask any one that reads these pages, Has not 
the past period of your life been upon the whole 
unsatisfactory? Are you not at this moment 
looking into the future, to find there what you 
have failed to find in the past ? Is not all you 
have attained at this moment flower without 
fruit, golden promises, rich expectancies, but 
not possessions? Could you say at this mo- 
ment, or any one else, the happiest man on 
earth, " Now let the wheel stop ; let me be left 
where I am, nothing changed, nothing added, 
nothing subtracted; let the flowers around me 
bloom for ever; let the skv that is over me 



EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 83 

thus shine; let all these be ever just as they 
now are ; let me and mine be permanent and 
fixed just as they are ?" Is there any man who 
would say so ? Not one. There is some thorn 
that each wants 'taken out — some discord that 
you wish subdued — some trouble you would 
have mitigated — some little cloud you want 
swept away. Many such things are in the lot 
of every one ; and no one I ever heard of could 
wish that he should be for ever just as he is at •, 
this present moment. 

Is not much of our present happiness drawn 
from the future ? Are we not happy, not be- 
cause of what we are, but because of what we 
expect to be ? Does not much of our happiness 
lie in the future, and very little of it indeed in 
the present? And yet, my dear reader, I can 
assure you, not from my experience, but from 
the Word of God, that as the past has been, as 
far as earthly satisfaction is concerned, the 
future will be too. Those blossoms that seem 
in the future so bright, will all fade before you 
reach them ; those pleasures which are sparkling 
in the distant horizon so gloriously, you will no 
sooner arrive at than you will find that their 
sparkles have become dim, or that your taste 

g2 



84 EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 

has altered, or that your feelings, passions, sus- 
ceptibilities of pleasure, are deadened ; so that, 
while you could enjoy them in prospect, you 
could not in possession. This is our own expe- 
rience at this moment. Even when we have 
been placed in the brightest and most happy 
circumstances, is it not true that, just when we 
have met with what the world would call some 
good fortune, or have got into some relationship 
or circumstance that promised happiness, where 
in short the heart had no need to sigh, but 
every reason to bound with joy, we have been 
conscious, even in such circumstances, of a sort 
of double-self? We have felt oneself saying : 
" Eat, drink, and be merry ; to-morrow will be 
as this day ; there will be no cloud, but all will 
be bright for ever •" and we have heard a still 
small voice, as if from another self, telling us 
the brightest sun fades — the longest day closes 
— the sweetest flower dies — and that here there 
is no rest or abiding-place for any, even for 
the people of God. 

Thus all things — instincts within, voices 
without, experience, reason, conscience — all say 
to us : " Arise, this is not your rest, sin has 
polluted it." Such is the experience of man; 



EARTH NOT YOUR REST. Ob 

such are the voices of the night — all in har- 
mony with God's word, sustaining and sup- 
porting it with irresistible evidence. 

If this be so — if this be not our rest — if, in 
our best and our most honest moments, we are 
forced to conclude, " It neither is, nor has been, 
nor is likely to be, nor is fit to be ;" then what 
is the duty that devolves upon us«? Let us pass 
patiently through it. The time is short. Weep 
over its trials as though you wept not; rejoice 
over its blessings as though you rejoiced not ; 
use the world as not abusing it, for the fashion 
of it speedily passeth away. Above all, if it be 
as I have described it, not f.t, not meant to be 
our rest, let us cease to seek for rest in it ; here 
it is not to be found. Do not repeat the con- 
stant experiment of the world, which has been 
made in palaces, in halls, and in huts ; by 
royalty, and by subjects ; in every latitude and 
longitude ; in every dispensation that God has 
given, and under every providence that God has 
sent; by all sorts of men, and in all sorts of 
places. The pyramids have been ransacked; 
Nineveh has been lifted from its ancient grave ; 
the remains of classic art have all been brought 
to light ; the mummies of two thousand years 



86 EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 

have been unrolled : their mysterious hierogly- 
phics have been deciphered : but nowhere, in 
no age, by no party, has that thing rest been 
found — that philosopher's stone, if you like to 
call it so — that perfect composure from all pains, 
that perfect opiate for all grief — that perfect 
satisfaction for all restlessness. " This is not 
your rest ; it is polluted.'''' 

What are the changes now taking place in 
the world ? what are all the convulsions of 
Europe which have been so often alluded to ? 
what are all its heaving dynasties, its still con- 
vulsed and agitated population ? all this con- 
stitution-making and constitution-mending ? 
what is this running from despotism to demo- 
cracy, and from monarchy to aristocracy ? what 
does it all mean ? It is the poor patient, hu- 
manity, changing its side. When a man is ill 
and lies on one side, he finds he has no rest 
then; he changes the side, but it is only to 
change again. All the agitation of the conti- 
nent of Europe is weary humanity, conscious of 
a fever it cannot quell — restless under a sin 
which it knows not where to get forgiveness for 
— changing its aching side, if peradventure it 
may get what is not to be had, except in that 



EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 87 

Book which has all true and precious prescrip- 
tions — the Book of Gocl — rest ! 

How great is man's soul ! If yon could 
point me a man ho had found satisfaction in 
this world, perfect and complete, so that he 
wished for nothing more, that man would give 
evidence that the soul is not what I have 
thought it to be ; but is not the fact, that no 
man has found, and that no man can find, any- 
thing like perfect rest in this world, evidence 
that the soul is greater than the world ? — that 
it was made to be satisfied with something 
higher, nobler, more glorious, than the world ? 
Whatever be its true rest, it is not the world ; 
whatever be its true happiness, it is not any- 
thing it can gather, or cull, or breathe, or 
drink, or clothe itself withal below. Let us 
learn, then, even from nature, were we without 
revelation, that man's soul does not die when 
the body dies. I know that materialists will 
reason and say, that as man's body grows 
weaker, and approaches to death, his soul seems 
gradually to go out too ; but this is not the 
fact. If it were universally the case, you might 
say that soul and body died together. But 
have we not often seen that, as the outward 



88 EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 

man has decayed incli by inch, the inward man 
has appeared to feed upon some hidden nutri- 
ment — to plume its wing, and rise with greater 
speed and glory, as if in search of a bright and 
enduring immortality. Men will say, as I have 
been reading, that when persons have been 
nearly dead, and have subsequently recovered, 
they have had no recollection, but that all has 
been stupor ; and they have argued that, there- 
fore, there must be cessation of life. But there 
are instances of an opposite kind; there are 
probabilities of another stamp ; the way which 
I should illustrate the matter would be this : — 
Suppose there is at the bottom of a deep ditch, 
some thousand feet deep, a curtain, and that, 
as soon as it is raised, the future glory which 
lies beyond it is revealed. One person who has 
fainted a little may be said to go down into 
that deep ravine a hundred feet ; he is drawn 
up again, and recollects nothing. Another, 
who falls into a deeper faint, may be said to 
descend nine hundred feet ; but he recollects 
nothing on being drawn up again. But a third 
person goes to the very bottom, and has just 
had a corner of the curtain lifted ; and he has 
seen sights such as Paul, who also saw it lifted, 






EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 89 

reports were not fitted for man to utter or ex- 
press — the glories of the third heaven, the 
splendours of Paradise revealed. I have read 
of persons who, under some disease or loss of 
blood, have been given up as dead. Some of 
them have said that they recollected nothing ; 
but others have said, and I have heard dying 
persons also say, that they saw bright visions — 
that a glorious apocalypse, an unearthly splen- 
dour, seemed to come upon them, like an ocean 
of beauty and of glory; and they regretted that 
they had to come back again to the land of 
tears and of the shadow of death. These are 
facts; true, sure, and attested facts, — some of 
which I have collected, — that prove that other 
men have had a glimpse of the better world 
besides Paul, and have testified, on their re- 
covery, that they had seen it. The soul, then, 
outlives the body ; and when we lay the poor, 
dissolving tenement in the dust, let us remem- 
ber it is not the man. Let us never forget this. 
We are so much the children of sense, that 
when we lose the well-known countenance, and 
the well-known form, we think " He is gone," 
as if there were an end of him. But it is not 
so ; he is not dead ; he has only begun to live ; 



90 EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 

he lias struck his tent in the desert, and has 
entered into the palace not made with hands ; 
he has laid aside the encumbrances of life, and 
now lives and rejoices for ever. Thus, then, we 
see the greatness of man's soul ; it has capaci- 
ties earth cannot fill ; a restlessness this world 
cannot quell ; appetencies, desires, instincts, that 
were made to be filled with something better, 
greater than the world can supply. Blessed be 
God, that all reason, experience, instinct, con- 
firm what he has said in few but emphatic 
words, " This is not your rest. 5 -' 

If you are convinced of this, my dear reader, 
why set your heart upon the world ? Why not 
struggle not to do so? \Vhy not view the 
world as a journey? Gather a few flowers as 
you pass through it, and be thankful. Regard 
it as a wilderness. Bow down and sip a little 
from the brook, as it runs past, but only to 
strengthen you to pursue your journey. Take 
the world's dignities and joys. Christianity 
does not bid you be an ascetic; it is no 
leveller ; it would not destroy or disorganise 
society ; but it asks you to take all its pleasures, 
its joys, its dignities, as refreshments on your 
journey ; it forbids you to stop there, to feast 



EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 91 

and be satisfied ; it enjoins you to go on with 
greater speed and greater energy, looking for 
a city that hath foundations, a better coun- 
try, " an inheritance that remaineth for the 
people of God." Our rest is in the future ; and 
our instinct, in looking into the future for it, is 
partly a Divine, partly a human one. The way 
to rest, and the only way, is that which was an- 
nounced in Palestine : " I am the way : no man 
cometh unto the Father, but by me." Man's 
soul had originally God for its inhabitant ; it 
has lost him; and, until God return to that 
soul, it can never have peace. Do not then, I 
beseech you, reader, not separating myself from 
you, do not let the world overwhelm you ; do 
not let your heart be crowded and trodden down 
by its traffic, its cares, and its toils. Rise above 
it ; live above it ; be in it, but not of it. 

And the way, let me add, to dislodge the 
love of the world that now is, is to read much, 
think much, of the brighter world that is to be. 
It is a great fact, as well as law of our nature, 
that we can never induce a man to lay aside 
the preference he has, by preaching against it. 
If there were men that were indulging in all 
the pleasures and amusements of the world, I 



92 EARTH NOT YOUR REST. 

should not think of beginning in the fiist in- 
stance to preach against them. I shonld never 
make a man give np the enjoyment that he has, 
whatever it be, until I have shown him, and 
made to bear upon him, a brighter enjoyment 
than he knows of. The only way to dislodge a 
bad preference is, to bring to bear upon it a 
good or a better preference. It is the brighter 
light that puts out the dim one ; it is the sun- 
beams shining on the grate that put out the 
fire j it is bringing the heavenly inheritance 
nearer, that will make your earthly preferences 
grow feebler. It is just in proportion as we 
interest the heart in the glorious beings of 
an age to come, that we withdraw it from the 
fleeting and frail pomps and vanities of the 
present life. 



CHAPTER IV. 

A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 

" Our cradle is the starting-place 
In life : we run the onward race 

And reach the goal, 
"When, in the mansions of the blest, 
Death leads to its eternal rest 
The weary soul." 

" There remaineth a rest for the people of God." — Heb. iv. 9. 

Having proved, I trust to the reader's satis- 
faction, that there is no spot in this world, from 
the lowest to the very loftiest pinnacle of human 
greatness, on which one can repose, and there 
enjoy a perfect and permanent rest ; it now 
devolves upon me to show what is the nature 
of that rest which is said to remain for the 
peeple of God, and who they are who are de- 
clared to have a right and title to it. 

Certainly the whole course of human history 
seems to indicate man's ceaseless search for a 



y4 A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 

rest; to find, as it were, some quiet spot of 
sunshine and verdure on which he can repose, 
and say — " Now, here I could wish to live for 
ever." The point, in short, to which all the 
countless currents that run in the channels of 
social intercourse continually flow, is rest. It 
has been sought during five thousand years, in 
sunshine and in cloud, in lowness and in great- 
ness ; and it has only been found upon the earth 
in Christ, and realised in its fullness in eternity, 
at God's right hand, where there are pleasures 
for evermore. 

This search for a rest explains all the pheno- 
mena of the world. What is the meaning of 
the advertisement in the newspaper — the com- 
plaint in the court of justice — the petition to 
parliament ? — Humanity seeking for rest? What 
is the interpretation of the school, the academy, 
the college, the Uoyal Exchange, the market- 
place ; what explains them all ? — Man in pur- 
suit of rest. In none of them has he found 
it, because this is not our rest; it remaineih 
far beyond for the people of God. 

Other efforts have been made to find it. In- 
tellect in Sir Isaac Newton swept the sky, 
counted the stars, weighed them, as it were, in 



A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 95 

scales, in search for some rest for the soles of 
his feet; and he found but an apology for a 
rest, when he pronounced gravitation to be the 
solvent of all. Imagination in him that saw all 
life like a drama, or in him who soared from 
Paradise Lost to Paradise Regained, found no 
rest; for, ere long, it faltered and folded its 
wing, and was dissatisfied still. Illustrious 
captains and generals have fought hard fields, 
wreathed round their brows the greenest laurels, 
expecting they had achieved a rest for their 
country; but instead, they found it a respite 
only for a little. Great statesmen have tasked 
their souls, and died in the mid-time of life, 
worn-out and wasted by their toils ; and have 
acknowledged that they only found a dry spot 
amid the waste of waters, soon again to be en- 
gulfed and covered by the all-encompassing and 
surrounding sea. Great nations, as only a short 
time ago, have risen in some dread paroxysm 
of restlessness, seeking to assert by force that 
which cannot be attained by force or secured 
by fraud — rest ; and they have found, to their 
bitter experience, that they might as well have 
clutched the volleyed lightnings, or tried to 
monopolise the sun. There is no rest upon 



96 A REST FOIl CHRISTIANS. 

earth : it is polluted. Every anticipation of a 
rest, as soon as the anticipated rest is reached, 
is found to be only an adjournment of the rest : 
at each stage a spirit meets us, and tells us — 
" This is not your rest." In the midst of the 
din and noise of the pursuit, a still small voice 
sounds in the depths of the deadest heart — 
" Why spend your money for that which is not 
bread, and your labour for that which satisfieth 
not?" On wealth, on fame, on science, on 
literature, on poor men's huts, on great men's 
homes, on all that man covets, toils for, strives 
for, aspires to, this inscription has been read, 
for five thousand years, and it will be read to 
the end, amid the tears of many a reader — 
" Whosoever drinketh of this water shall thirst 
again " — in other words, " This is not your 
rest ; it remaineth, it is beyond, for the people 
of God." 

Now, the reason of this is partly in the world, 
and partly in the soid of the inhabitant. This 
world was made originally holy, beautiful, and 
good ; but sin infected it ; and the instant that 
sin infected the world, paralysis, ague, fever, 
ceized npon it, and it has been convulsed and 
restless since. Man's soul, too, by its very 



A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 97 

nature, explains why he cannot find rest here. 
Man's soul is greater than sun, and moon, and 
stars, and all created things ; it Avas made for 
something greater than what it sees. There is 
nothing greater than man's soul but God him- 
self. It is the evidence of that soul's ruin that 
it seeks for rest upon the earth ; it is the evi- 
dence of that soul's aboriginal grandeur, and 
an augury of its future destiny, that nothing 
upon earth can fill it. It has capacities which 
earth cannot satisfy, yearnings and desires which 
stretch beyond the stars; and it gives evidence, 
even now, that its rest can only be found in 
that which is higher and greater than itself — 
that is, in God. 

To all earnest spirits, weary, way-worn, and A, 
tired, having often sought rest and found it but 
restlessness, — having appealed to what they 
thought a fountain, and having found it but a 
broken cistern, these words must sound like the 
angel-accents at Bethlehem, or like home-music 
echoing from the sky — " There remaineth a 
rest." You shall not be disappointed for ever : 
your large capacities shall not he left unfilled 
for ever ; there is a rest for you. Atheism gives 
you a grave; Deism points you to a blank; 

H 



98 A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 

Superstition to purgatorial torment; but Chris- 
tianity, in its own grand tones, tells you, what 
none besides can tell, " There remaineth a rest 
\/for the people of God." 

But while this rest remaineth for the people 
of God, an earnest of it is to be enjoyed here, 
as a pledge of its attainment hereafter. Let me 
first, then, show you where the earnest of it is 
to be enjoyed here, and in whom. 
^ The apostle leads us, in this very epistle, to 
expect that some anticipation or earnest of it 
may be tasted here. He says, in the third 
verse of this chapter, — " For we which have 
believed do enter into rest," as a present pos- 
session; and yet he says, in the next verse, — 
'" There remaineth a rest for the people of God." 
It is explained by this, that every man who is 
going to heaven has the first-fruits of heaven 
already. God gives him a few flowers from 
that glorious land, not only to cheer him in his 
pilgrimage, but to be a pledge that he shall 
ultimately be admitted into its full enjoyment. 
To show and prove that Ave shall find the lasting 
and the immutable rest, he gives us now a 
partial and anticipatory rest. He gives it in 
those blessed words which we have often read, 



A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 99 

but the full meaning of which we never can 
exhaust — " Come unto me, all ye that are weary 
and heavy laden, and I will give you rest." 
John could say, — " Behold the Lamb V 3 Peter 
could say, — " To whom can we go but unto 
thee?" Apostles, and evangelists, and minis- 
ters can say, — " Go to Jesus ;" but Jesus could 
stand, with no beauty upon him that men 
should desire him, and say, with all the soft- 
ness of human sympathy, but with all the 
grandeur of a present Deity, — " Come unto me, 
all ye that are weary and heavy laden, and IV 
will give you rest." 

Let me, then, notice this anticipatory rest, 
this earnest of rest, and how we are to find it. 
The future rest is for the people of God — 
" There remaineth a rest for the people of 
God." The present is "rest" in trouble; the 
future is "rest" from trouble. The present 
rest, the rest that you are invited to seek, is for 
every one who is " weary and heavy laden." 
Jesus assigns no qualification, no requisite, ex- 
cept this — that you are consciously weary and 
heavy laden, and that you want rest. Do I 
address, then, any exhausted with the toils of 
the week, blighted in his hopes, disappointed in 

h 2 



100 A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 

heart, whose thoughts of the future are fore- 
bodings, whose reminiscences of the past are 
sorrow; who has applied to many a fountain, 
and has found it but a cistern : who has thought 
that he had a rest, and has found it was not ? — 
my brethren, without anything to do or to feel 
first, or to repent first, we are called upon, just 
because we are weary and heavy laden, and for 
no other reason, to come, just as we are, to 
Jesus, and find instant rest. The invitation is, 
" Come" — the word used throughout the Bible 
to denote simply — " believe," " exercise trust, " 
or " confidence." Just as the manslayer, when 
he ran from the avenger of blood, rushed into 
the " city of refuge," and there had rest, — just 
as the wounded Israelite looked at the serpent 
of brass, and, by a Divine ordinance, had instant 
health ; so you are called upon to flee to Jesus 
upon the wings of affection, to lean upon Jesus 
with the hand of the heart, to look to Jesus 
with the eye of the soul, and to be assured that, 
as truly as you thus lean, and look, and flee, that 
God's mercy will descend upon you, to forgive 
you, and God's Spirit will plant in your heart 
that sweet sense of repose which is the earnes 
of the " rest that remaineth for the people of 



A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 101 

God." Jesus says, — " Come unto me, all ye 
that are weary and heavy laden." Yon are not 
to stop in your flight at anything between you 
and the Lord Jesus Christ. He does not say, 
— " Come to the church." The church is use- 
ful as a witness to Christ ; but the instant that 
the church places herself in the room of Christ, 
that instant she will be cast out as " salt that 
has lost its savour." Nor does he say — " Come 
to the Sacraments." Precious they are, each 
in its place ; but these are not gods ; they can- 
not save us; they are only means by which 
we can apprehend Jesus more clearly, — lenses 
through which we can see further off " the 
King in his beauty," and the blessings that he 
oners us. Nor are we to come to the minister. 
The minister is a witness, like the church, to 
Jesus : " whom we preach," is his function ; 
but the instant that he directs the notice of the 
people to his own pretensions, and withholds or 
diverts it from his Master's glory, — the instant 
he speaks of what he is, whilst he is dumb upon 
what his Master is, — the instant he makes his 
own succession, or his own discipline, or his 
own form, to be everything, and the claims of 
Jesus something by the by, his right hand will 



102 A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 

be withered, — his tongue will cleave to the roof 
of his mouth ; and he will realise the awful fact, 
that he that tries to steal a ray from the glory 
of God takes a curse into his own bosom. Jesus 
says, then, — " Come unto me." No priest, or 
presbyter, or synod, or general assembly, or 
archbishop, or pope, or prelate, has any right 
to stand between the greatest sinner and instant 
peace through the blood of Jesus Christ. 

We have read in our school- days of the in- 
cident related of Diogenes the Cynic and Alex- 
ander the Great. It is said that the Mace- 
donian monarch one day saw the Cynic basking 
in the sunshine, in his tub. That great mo- 
narch was so charmed with his quiet serenity 
that, envying the peace which the philosopher 
had, which was a stranger to the prince's bosom, 
he substantially said to him : — " Diogenes, I 
am so delighted with you, that you need only 
ask and I will give you anything, to the half of 
my kingdom." The Cynic philosopher replied : 
"Please your Majesty, I have only one favour 
to ask ; that is, that you will stand aside from 
between me and the sun, in whose beams I am 
now enjoying myself." Were a hierarch that 
surrounds the throne, were a saint or angel, or 



A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 103 

the Virgin Mary, to come down to me, and ask 
me the greatest favour they could do me, I 
would not ask them either to plead for me, or 
to pray for me ; all I would beg of them would 
be, to stand aside from between me and the 
beams of that Sun under whose wings there is 
shelter, and in whose light there are life, and 
happiness, and perpetual rest." Come unto me, 
all ye that are weary aad heavy laden, and I 
will give you rest" — the earnest of a rest that 
will be. 

The rest that we find in Jesus, will be found 
to be a complete rest to all that is now restless 
and dissatisfied within us. Reason in its pur- 
suit, imagination in its flight, the heart in its 
throbbings, conscience in its disquiet, will each 
and all find rest in the knowledge of Jesus. The 
conscience will find blood that can pacify it; 
the reason will find God " just, while he justifies 
the ungodly •" and the heart will find love gene- 
rated within it, as responsive to that love which 
God has shown to it. In Christ we find rest 
under the conviction of sin. What makes our 
days so often wretched and our nights restless ? 
The main thing — not indeed the only thing — is 
sin in the conscience. As sure as Jonah in the 



104 A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 

ship created the storm in the elements around 
it, so sure sin, indulged in, unexpiated, unfor- 
given, will create a quarrel between the con- 
science and the heart, which will increase disquiet 
and uneasiness within. In such a state, then, 
what can give us rest? — to know this — "The 
blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth from all sin." 
Glorious truth ! — " He that knew no sin, was 
made sin for me, that I might be made the 
righteousness of God by him ; and " justified by 
faith, we have peace with God through Jesus 
Christ." If, then, I address one who has recol- 
lections of sins that grieve, the past period of 
whose life is felt more than sufficient to condemn, 
— reader, just as you are, without previous pre- 
paration, cast your soul upon the sacrifice of 
Jesus ; seek the forgiveness of that sin in the 
efficacy of that blood; and the deep sense of 
gratitude you will feel for so transcendant a 
mercy, will make you love God with your whole 
heart, and go out and serve God with ycur 
whole life. 
^ But we have not only rest in Jesus, under 
the sense of sin, but we have also rest in him 
under the experience of sorrow. Some one has 
said that man was made to mourn. Originally 



A REST TOR CHRISTIANS. 105 

Le was made to be happy; God never made 
man to be sad ; sin, and the results of sin, have 
so made him ; it is as primary a design of Chris- 
tianity to make man happy as to make man holy. 
If we have no happiness, it is not because there 
is not plenty in the Gospel, but because Ave 
do not open our hearts honestly to receive it. 
If, then, we are in sorrow, we shall find rest in 
Christ. Sorrow is the heir-loom of humanity : 
since sin entered, and death by sin, its melan- 
choly tale is found in the chronicles of every 
land ; its experience is familiar to every heart. 
Affinities we deemed perpetual are dissolved ; 
the desire of our eyes is swept away ; fair faces 
that smiled on us, and whose smiles we reci- 
procated, are borne to the "rest that remaineth 
for the people of God ;" and we have felt and 
found a chasm that all the world's magnificence, 
riches, sympathies, consolations, never, never 
can fill. A Christian, in such circumstances, 
feels rest in Jesus ; he hears his voice — " It is 
I, be not afraid." He recollects the beautiful 
prescription — " Is any man afflicted, let him 
pray : is any man merry ? let him sing psalms." 
And thus he regards his afflictions as sent ; he 
prays, and is quieted : he regards his joys as 



106 A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 

given ; lie praises, and is satisfied still ; and in 
hotli circumstances he lias rest. 
A In all outward dispensations, too, the Chris- 
tian feels and finds rest. Does he lose his 
property? his health? his children? he knows 
there is no chance in any of these occurrences. 
Chance is a word for an atheist's vocabulary; 
it is not a word found in a Christian's Bible. 
Til the sparrow that falls, weary in its flight, 
and in the angel that sings before the throne 
— in the leaf swept from the tree in autumn, 
and in the crushing of a dynasty, or the ex- 
plosion of a throne — in all that is elegantly 
little, and in all that is magnificently great — 
in tho great roaring torrent of public life, and 
in the little eddies and streamlets of private 
and individual experience, God is guiding all, 
controlling all, conveying happiness to them 
that are his, and working out glory to his name 
as the ultimate and blessed issue. The Chris- 
tian, therefore, has peace. 

Have we any experience of this peace ? 
There are but two sorts of peace : there is the 
world's peace, which is an opiate that stills the 
conscience for a season — peace, peace, but no 
peace ; and there is the Christian's peace — the 



A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 107 

peace that passeth -understanding. You who 
have light in your heads, but no grace in your 
hearts, who feel life too little to satisfy you, 
death too awful to be ventured on — you that 
dare not give yourselves wholly to the world, 
and will not give yourselves wholly to God — 
who will not renounce your sins because your 
passions forbid you, and dare not renounce re- 
ligion because your conscience instantly checks 
you — who dread scepticism lest it should fail 
you, and living religion lest it should disappoint 
you — you are the most unhappy men of all; 
you have neither the world's rest, which is the 
opiate for a season, nor the rest of the Christian 
the peace that passeth understanding. You 
have feelings that you can neither stifle nor 
satisfy ; and you are, therefore, of all men the 
most wretched. Leave the broken cistern ; come 
to the fountain. Make the experiment of being- 
decided, thorough, right-hearted Christians. 
There is no consistent medium, no resting-place, 
between the freezing atheism which says, " No 
God," and the evangelical, vital, active Chris- 
tianity which teaches us that God is our Father, 
and heaven our home, and all men brethren, 
and life a pilgrimage to happiness and glory. 



108 A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 

I have thus, then, spoken of the earnest of 
the rest that remains for the people of God. I 
need not repeat that nothing else but Jesus — 
no one thing but faith, and confidence, and 
close communion and walk with him, can pos- 
sibly give us that rest which is the thirst of 
all humanity, but the attainment only of the 
people of God. That spirit that spans the uni- 
verse cannot be satisfied with a grain of sand. 
The eye that descends to the depths, the soar- 
ing thought that stretches beyond the stars, 
never, never can be at rest until it finds its 
centre and its resting-place in the bosom of 
God. 

But this is the earnest of a rest : the true 
rest remains, we are told, for the people of 
God. The rest that a Christian now has is a 
rest in trouble ; the rest that a Christian will 
have is a rest from trouble. It is the same as 
that spoken of in the Revelation, where it 
says : — I heard a voice from heaven, saying, 
Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord; 
yea, saith the Spirit, from henceforth, for they 
rest from their labours. ;; How beautiful is that 
text ! They die in the Lord — that is their safety 
— as the branch is in the vine. \Ve can never 



A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 109 

say a servant is in his master; that would be 
absurd. Then this strange phrase, "in Christ/ 3 
must mean something more than being follow- 
ers of Christ : it means being united to him — 
resting upon him — deriving life from him, for- 
giveness, sanctification, happiness from him. 
Then " Blessed are the dead that die in the 
Lord," as their state of safety, their blessedness, 
being that they "rest from their labours." The 
trail of light and beauty that follows them is 
reflected from their works. They are repre- 
sented as following the Lamb, and their works 
following them. It is not said that their works 
precede, and that they follow — this would mean 
that their works would be a title to heaven ; but 
it says that Christ precedes — the Christian 
follows, and the works follow the Christian. 
Job also alludes to this rest when lie says, 
" There the weary are at rest." The apostle 
also explains it when he says, " You who are 
troubled rest with us." 

And yet this rest is not insensibility. Man's 
soul never sinks into torpor. It is an awful 
delusion that the soul at death becomes insen- 
sible till the resurrection. I believe even natural 
religion would teach us that man's soul, when 



110 A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 

severed from the body, so far from becoming 
insensible, is only emancipated from its prison, 
to unfold a broader pinion, and soar with a 
more majestic flight, until it basks in the 
beatific vision, and sings beside the throne of 
the Most High. Thus, when we are mourning 
over the beloved dead — some father, or mother, 
or sister, or brother, or husband, or wife — and 
gazing upon the cold face on which the last 
smile of life still lingers — and weeping, as 
though this were our relative ; that soul eman- 
cipated, if permitted by God's great laws to 
speak to us, would say : — " Weep not for me, 
but weep for yourselves. I have laid aside, not 
life, but the shackles of life; I have not left 
happiness, but entered upon it ; I am not dead, 
T have only begun to live. Come up hither ! 
Come speedily, and share with me those joys 
that shall never be suspended — that rest that 
shall never be broken." 

This rest, then, which remaineth for the 
people of God, I would notice, in the first 
place, will be rest from ail bodily pain. " The 
inhabitant shall not say, I am sick." Sickness 
and death are perfectly unnatural things ; and 
I am not surprised that men shrink from death 






A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. Ill 

— that most unnatural catastrophe. Man was 
made to live ; and it is sin, the foul blot that 
has fallen upon the earth, and generated disease 
and decay, that renders death now necessary 
at all. This death to the worldling — that is, 
to the man who has no religion, must be a 
terrific thing. I wonder how any man can have 
twelve hours' quiet who has not some clear, or 
rather conclusive evidence that he is going to 
the "rest that remaineth for the people of 
God." I wonder, on the other hand, how any 
man can have ten minutes' unhappiness who 
knows that God is his Father; that that blessed 
Saviour has gone to prepare a home for him ; 
and that, as sure as he dies, whether death shall 
be sudden, or the result of protracted disease, 
instant death shall be instant glory, and, in 
any shape, the vestibule of happiness for ever. 
The rest, then, that " remaineth for the people 
of God" will be free from all pain and from 
all sickness. Then the mind will be able to 
pursue its excursions; then it will enjoy powers 
adequate to the analysis of all that is submitted 
to it : it will not have to complain of the aching 
head, nor to resign its toils because of the 
fainting heart ; but freed from the fetters and 



112 A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 

restrictions of mortality, it will put forth a 
vigour and a power of which we have now hut 
a dim conception — a vigour and a power of 
which it has given occasional intimations in 
its grand discoveries; hut heside which, when 
it takes its place in heaven, the most bril- 
liant discoveries of human genius will appear 
like children's playthings, that perish in the 
using. 

In that rest, too, the soul will be free from all 
mental anxiety and grief. Here, it is the ex- 
perience of every Christian, that there are fears 
within and fightings without. How often do 
we weep because our plans have miscarried! and 
how often do we fear that our future plans will 
miscarry also ! How often do we lament the 
deceptions practised upon us in trade ! How 
much do we fear and suspect those with whom 
we have intercourse in the market or in the 
exchange, from the necessities of human nature, 
and the weaknesses of human character ! But 
when that day comes — when that bright rest 
dawns, no want will tempt us to do wrongly, 
no passion will drive us to do rashly. All 
passion, in as far as it is evil, shall be purged ; 
all wants shall be abundantly satisfied; there 



A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 113 

shall be no aching void; we shall admit that 
we are, as David said he would be, " satisfied 
when I awake with thy likeness." 

In that blessed rest we shall be free from all 
the disputes and the controversies that agitate 
the world and society 'at large. All disputes 
will be settled on the confines of heaven ; all 
controversies that have convulsed the world 
will be forbidden there. We shall then see, 
as the apostle tells us, eye to eye. Providence, 
with its ups and downs, will be luminous ; all 
mysteries will be unravelled — all hieroglyphs 
explained — all discords resolved in harmony. 
There shall be no war, nor battle, nor conflict, 
nor sound of clarion, nor " garments rolled in 
blood ;" because holiness shall beat in man's 
heart, and happiness shall be breathed in man's 
life for ever. 

In that rest, when it comes, too, there will 
be no loss by death. Here our circles upon 
earth become fewer, and those that we love are 
constantly removed; but in that better land, 
not only will there be no death, but those that 
were severed from us by death below will be 
re-united and joined to us in happiness above. 
The broken circles of families will be com- 

i 



114 A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 

pleted ; those that we loved and parted with in 
agony, shall rejoin us ; the doors that shut us 
in, shall shut all sorrow out ; the loveliest 
blessing will be the longest ; all space shall be 
full of light; our praise will be a perpetual 
hymn; and our hearts ever bounding, and 
never breaking. 

And this rest, let me add, at some of the 
features of which I have glanced, is to be an 
eternal rest : " There remaineth a rest for the 
people of God : " — it is for ever ; it fadeth not 
away. No frost shall nip its flowers, no cloud 
darken its sky ; the rest shall never be dis- 
turbed for ever and ever. 

This rest of which I ana speaking is coming 
nearer and nearer to us every hour. Every day 
that closes, takes from the length of life and. 
from the lustre of things that are seen. The 
tide seems already to approach our feet ; the 
first waves of that eternal sea rise and swell 
upon the sand on which w r e now stand. Very 
soon what we call life — that little isthmus 
between time and eternity — shall be covered 
by the vast unsounded ocean into which all of 
us must speedily enter. Every day that we live, 
that eternity is coming nearer ; everv pulse of 



A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 115 

our heart is a warning that it is so. Let me 
ask you, reader, Are you ready for it ? Are you 
thirsting for it ? Do you long for it ? Do you 
enjoy everything that tells you of it ? and feel 
that you are happier because you hear that 
" there remaineth a rest for the people of 
God?" 

This leads me, in the last place, to notice 
for whom this rest is designed. I said the 
rest in trouble " is for the weary and heavy 
laden ; " the rest from trouble is here pro- 
nounced to be for " the people of God." Who 
are they ? They have been branded by many 
names, but they are still the same; they have 
been often caricatured, but they are still the 
people of God. They will not be so many as the 
Universalist alleges, nor so few as the exclusive 
Antinomian alleges. If I rightly estimate their 
character, they are not distinguished by an 
outer robe, nor yet by the pronunciation of a 
popular Shibboleth. Many of them worship in 
chapels, many in churches, some in cathedrals. 
Some pray without a liturgy, some pray with 
one; some praise with an instrument, some 
praise without one ; but all with the heart. 
Of these, some are Churchmen, and some are 



116 A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 

Dissenters, and some are even in the bosom 
of the Church of Rome — not of it, yet in it. 
Whatever be the names by which they are dis- 
tinguished on earth, they are known in the 
catalogues of glory only by one — the living 
people of the Living God. It is only when a 
little of the light of that upper world falls upon 
the petty disputes of this present world, that 
we see how all that man calls great is crowded 
into a very little bulk ; whilst the least that 
God pronounces true, assumes a size, an import- 
ance, and a magnificence that awe and astonish 
us. It is thus that God's people are in all sys- 
tems, in all sects and parties; and yet they 
have characteristics by which they are clearly 
and distinctly known. I do not undervalue 
sections of the Church. Perhaps it is God's 
ordinance that our ecclesiastical being should 
be kept pure by antagonism and disputes ; and 
one can see, that the distinction into the varied 
sects that have existed from the beginning, has 
been overruled to do great good. The Jews 
had the charge of the Old Testament : if the 
Jew tried to touch it, the Samaritan would 
have instantly corrected him ; if the Pharisee 
had tried to alter a verse, the Sadducee would 



A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 117 

have instantly pounced npon him, and exposed 
him ; if either had tried to alter, another sect 
would have noticed and proclaimed it. So in 
the history of the Church. If the Churchman 
should put in something that was not in the 
Bible originally, to prove his form, the Dis- 
senter would instantly note it ; and if the Dis- 
senter were to interpolate something that would 
tend in his direction, the Churchman would 
instantly expose him. If the Baptists were to 
put in a word, showing that adults only were to 
be baptised, the Psedobaptist would correct him ; 
and if the Psedobaptist were to insert anything 
in favour of his argument, the A.ntipsedobaptist 
would correct him. Thus, those divisions which 
are the evidence of the weakness of man, are- 
overruled by the wisdom and goodness of God, 
to keep our Christianity alive, and our Bibles 
pure and uncorrupted, even to the end. Let us 
hate sectarianism ; let us pray for and love all 
that love the Lord Jesus Christ. Each church 
may be likened to a tree ; each tree growz in 
its own congenial and native clime : its roots 
grow best in its own soil, but all the branches 
of all the trees wave in the unsectarian air ; the 
fruits of all ripen in the beams of one catholic 



118 A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 

sun ; and the fibres of all are connected with 
the fibres of the tree of life by roots running 
underground, invisible to us, but real and last- 
ing, the planting of the Lord. 

But while it is thus true that God's people 
are found in all denominations, it is no less true 
that these people for whom the rest is provided, 
have clear, and sharp, and definite character- 
istics. However beautiful the rest may be, I 
beseech you, my readers, to think less of the 
rest, with its coming beauty; and think each 
for a moment more intently — " Have I the 
characteristics of those for whom that rest is 
being made ready ? " 

First, then, the people of God have this 
grand characteristic in common — that they 
receive and cleave to the Bible in its integrity 
and purity, as the only rule of faith. In re- 
ligious matters, the Bible, without a clasp — 
nay, without a comment — is their only and 
conclusive directory; so that these people of 
God care very little what is man's opinion of 
the Bible, but care very much what is the 
Bible's opinion of man. Their creed, in short, 
is, not what the best men say, nor what the 
most men say, but it is simply what God has 



A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 119 

said ; and they accept as truth, not that which 
has majorities behind it, or splendour, pomp, 
and grandeur embosoming it, but that which 
has prefixed to it, "Thus saith the Lord." 
Here is the very first stage in our Christianity: 
we must accept this book, on evidence that 
is satisfactory to us, as from God; and ever 
as this book speaks, we must see an end to 
all discussion ; whatever it says plainly, clearly, 
and unequivocally, it is our highest duty, our 
purest happiness, heartily to receive, embrace, 
and act upon. 

The second feature of the people of God is, 
that they take as their title to the "rest that 
remaineth for the people of God," the right- 
eousness and the sacrifice of Christ alone : they 
may be the most moral, the most upright, the 
most excellent, the most virtuous ; but yet, if 
they are the people of God, their language is 
this : — ' ' There is none other name given among 
men whereby we can be saved, but the name of 
Jesus." Hence, a Christian does not look to 
anything he has suffered, as an expiation for his 
sin, or to anything he has done, as a title to 
happiness ; he puts his good deeds and his bad 
deeds at the foot of the cross ; he begs forgive- 



120 A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 

ness, through the blood of Jesus, for both ; and 
resting upon the finished righteousness and 
perfect sacrifice of the Lamb of God, justified 
by faith, he has peace with God. This beautiful 
text is the epitome of his title, " He that knew 
no sin was made sin for me." How was Christ 
made sin for me ? By my sin being imputed 
to Him. Well, just in the same manner, says 
the apostle, " that I might be made the right- 
eousness of God by Him." How am I made 
the righteousness of God by him? By his 
righteousness being imputed to me. So that 
Christ was the spotless lamb in the tainted 
fleece of my transgressions : and I am the 
tainted, but forgiven sheep, in the glorious 
fleece of the Redeemer's righteousness. And 
as it was just in God that Jesus should suffer 
because of my sins lying upon Him, God is only 
faithful and just to acquit me because of Jesus' 
righteousness lying upon me. There is my 
foundation ; there is my trust — that which Paul 
proclaimed, that which Martin Luther excavated 
from the rubbish in which it was buried, that 
which shines from every page of the Bible, and 
ought to sound in every sermon — free, instant, 
glorious forgiveness by faith alone, through 



A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 121 

the precious sacrifice of Jesus, for which the 
Church is built, for which a ministry is con- 
tinued, and the renunciation of which is the 
renunciation of its essential and noblest offices 
and functions. 

In the next place, the people of God have not 
only this title to the rest, but they have a fit- 
ness for it. Now, what is this fitness ? It is the 
work of the Holy Spirit within them. Are you 
aware that it needs, not only Christ's finished 
work without you to be your title to heaven, 
but it needs also the Spirit's progressive work 
within you to be your fitness for heaven? It 
is as necessary that I should be made fit for 
this rest, as it is that I should be entitled to 
it. Now, what will make me fit ? Baptism 
may cleanse the flesh : it cannot regenerate 
the heart. Baptism, precious in its place, as 
an admission into the outward and the visible 
Church, has no magic power, no exorcising vir- 
tue to alter, transform, and renew the heart that 
is dead in sin. It needs the same omnipotent 
power that opened the grave of Jesus, to open 
my heart, and make it live again. " Except a 
man" — it does not matter who he is, rich or 
poor, high or low — " be born again of the Spirit 



122 A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 

of God, he cannot see the kingdom of God;" 
and unless that change take place in ns now, 
we shall never know what rest is in Jesus, nor 
enter into rest hereafter. 

But I may notice that there is one word here 
which conveys an idea of the character of those 
who enter into this rest ; it is in the word trans- 
lated " rest.-" It is said that there remaineth 
a 2a/3/3arto-^oc for the people of God ; literally 
translated, " a Sabbath-keeping," as if there 
were something so holy, beautiful, and sweet in 
the earthly Sabbath, that a Christian, by the 
enjoyment of his Sabbaths upon earth, antici- 
pates and covets as his dearest joy an everlasting 
Sabbath, when time shall be no more. And it 
is very much by what you feel of pleasure in 
the Sabbath now, that you may estimate your 
fitness for the everlasting Sabbath. The man 
to whom the Sabbaths upon earth have no 
beauty, to whose ear the chimes of Sabbath- 
bells have no music, and to whose heart the 
exercises of the Sabbath sanctuary come home 
tvith no stirring eloquence and influential force, 
gives but poor evidence that he is ripening for 
that everlasting " Sabbath-keeping" that re- 
maineth for the people of God. x The Sabbath 



A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 123 

upon earth is a fragment of heaven, set like a 
gem in the brow of r&is world : it is, as it were, 
an island struck off from the continent of eter- 
nity, cast down into the roaring torrents of 
human life, standing upon which we can see 
the sunshine of the better land, hear the chimes 
of its jubilee, and, by our experience of the 
sweetness of our Sabbath here, rejoice that 
there will one day be a Sabbath which shall 
never be disturbed by the sound of the railway- 
whistle, or darkened by the cloud of the manu- 
factory smoke, or disturbed by our sins, or 
clouded by our prejudices, or interrupted by 
our infirmities; where necessity and mercy, 
which are now just pleas upon earth, shall 
be no pleas, because not needed at all, for 
ever. 

Reader, do you enjoy the Sabbath — not as a 
penance, but as a festival, after the weary week 
is done? Are you thankful for the Sabbath 
light? Is it to you the brightest day of the 
seven, the day that you most enjoy, which you 
would not give up for all the days of all the 
week besides ? 

Lastly, the people of God love and follow 
the Lord Jesus Christ. " These are they that 



124 A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 

follow the Lamb :" " He that hath my com- 
mandments, and keepeth them, he it is that 
loveth me." 

Such, then, are some of the characteristics of 
the people of God. They are found in all quar- 
ters of the globe : they are found on the frozen 
ledges of Greenland, and in the regions of per- 
petual snow ; in pathless deserts, and under the 
torrid zone ; in palaces, in halls, in huts, in 
hovels ; in all denominations, in all ranks and 
degrees of life : having these characteristics — 
that while they live everywhere, wherever they 
live, they are either the lights that visibly illu- 
minate the world, or the salt that silently, but 
persistently, leavens it. And many, as I have 
said, are in the number of the people of God 
whom we, in our uncharitableness, are apt to 
exclude. Many a poor tonsured monk, who 
superstitiously carried the crucifix in his hand, 
may, notwithstanding, by some ray of the better 
light penetrating his heart, lean upon the true 
crucifix, Christ, and Him crucified; and meet us, 
a fellow possessor of the " rest that remaineth 
for the people of God." Some poor Jew, who, 
in his ignorance and his sin, rejected the Mes- 
siah, as described by John the Evangelist^ may 



A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 125 

be trusting in the Messiah as described by 
Isaiah the prophet — the same Saviour differently 
described ; and such we may meet, " an Israelite 
indeed, in whom there is no guile;" who has 
(< washed his robes, and made them white, 
in the blood of the Lamb," and therefore is 
"before the throne, and serves him day and 
night." 

To you who know the characteristics of the 
people of God, I issue the invitation. Join this 
holy fellowship ; decide for Christ ; think of 
that solemn calculation, " What shall it profit 
a man if he gain the whole world, and lose his 
own soul ?" Study the answer to this great 
question, "What must I do to be saved?" The 
real and vital question is, not the sect you 
belong to, the form you worship in, but the life 
you live, the trust you exercise, the righteous- 
ness you are clothed with, the regeneration of 
heart which you have or have not. If you are 
one of the people of God, all things are bearing 
you to this blessed rest. Power crumbles in 
possession ; wealth consumes ; fame is but a 
breath ; riches take wings, and flee away. These 
things but feed the passions, or perfume the 



126 A HEST FOR CHRISTIANS. 

senses, or beautify the grave ; but holiness is 
happiness, and both remain for ever and ever. 
Every star that comes forth upon the brow of 
night seems to say to you, " Come up hither." 
Voices additional to this, borne down in the 
stillness of the night — the voices of the glorious 
company of the Apostles, the noble army of 
Martyrs, the goodly fellowship of Prophets, bid 
you " Come up hither." And when the noise 
of the world is hushed, and all the glare of the 
world is darkened, and you are silent, and still, 
and alone, do there not seem, sometimes, sound- 
ing like sweet music in the very depths of your 
heart, the voices of near and dear ones with 
whom you parted years ago, saying, " We are 
happy : hasten to this rest ; look to that blessed 
Saviour; make ready for the coming welcome; 
come up thither ; be happy with us for ever ! " 
Above all, that voice, not the least musical and 
precious also, the voice of Jesus, unspent by 
distance, unexhausted by years, sounds along 
t'je centuries of time, and finds an echo in my 
voi e, and in your hearts, this day : " Come 
unto me, all ye that are weary and heavy laden, 
and I will give you rest." Oh, God grant that 



A REST FOR CHRISTIANS. 127 

from the silent depths of a thousand hearts this 
blessed answer may he given : " Son of God, 
we come, we come : Son of God, to whom can 
we go but unto thee ? Thou hast the words of 
Eternal Life." 



CHAPTER Y. 

NATURE'S TRAVAIL AND EXPECTANCY. 

Earth 
Uplifts a general cry for guilt and wrong, 
And Heaven is listening. The forgotten graves 
Of the heart-broken utter forth their plaint. 

From battle-fields, 
Where heroes madly drove and dashed their hosts 
Against each other, rises up a noise, 
As if the armed multitudes of dead 
Stirred in their heavy slumber. 

Mournful tones 
Come from the green abysses of the sea, 
A story of the crimes the guilty sought 
To hide beneath its waves. 

What then shall cleanse thy bosom, gentle earth, 
From all its painful memories of guilt — 

That so at la«t, 
The horrid tale of perjury and strife, 
Murder and spoil, which men call history, 
May seem a fable, like the inventions told 
By poets of the gods of Greece ? 

" For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the 
manifestation of the sons of God. For the creature was 
made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him 
who hath subjected the same in hope, Because the creature 
itself also shall be delivered from the bondage of corrup- 
tion into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For 
we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth 
in pain together until now. — Rom. viii. 19 — 22. 

Our sufferings are not peculiar to ourselves : 
they are co-incident with the sufferings of all 



created tilings, that is, all fallen nature ; and 
thus the glory which is to be revealed shall not 
be monopolised by us, but shared by the vast 
creation under and around us. 

This passage is extremely beautiful j rich in 
imagery, glorious in hope, and very much fitted, 
I ihink, to sustain, delight, and comfort us. I 
must, however, state, by way of preliminary 
remark, that a great deal of controversy has 
arisen about the meaning of the word translated 
here " creature." The word translated "creature" 
is KTiiiQ. It occurs nineteen times in the New 
Testament, and out of these nineteen times, 
about fourteen times it must mean simply the 
created universe, the dumb brute, the material 
earth, stones, wood, flower, fruit, and sea. Such 
a meaning is evidently intended in such a pas- 
sage as this, for instance, " From the beginning 
of the creation." (Mark x. 6.) Nobody can 
deny, that in the last text here the inanimate 
creation is meant. But in this very chapter the 
word occurs in this sense ; and if we find in this 
chapter the word but once, undeniably referring 
to the inanimate creation or the material world, 
it does seem but fair to suppose that the Apcstle 
uses the word throughout in the same ascertained 



130 nature's travail and expectancy. 

sense. At the close of the chapter it is written : 
"Nor height, nor depth, nor any other crea- 
ture :" here, I humbly think, it cannot mean 
men. " I am persuaded that neither death, nor 
life, nor angels, nor principalities [evidently 
spiritual wickedness in high places], nor powers, 
nor things present [things, neuter], nor things 
to come [neuter still], Nor height [not a ra- 
tional being, nor depth nor any other creature 
\_kt'igic\, shall be able to separate us from the 
love of God." And, therefore, I should say 
throughout this chapter the word must be used 
as descriptive of creation, and not of God's 
rational offspring. I state this, because two in- 
terpretations are given of this passage. The one 
opinion, entertained by eminent men, and good 
men, far abler scholars than I am, is that it means 
the whole unconverted part of the human family, 
as contrasted with the Sons of God ; that is, that 
the whole of the unconverted, Gentile, and Jew, 
and Heathen, groan and travail, waiting for the 
adoption, that is, the redemption of the body, 
and looking for the manifestation of the sons 
of God. 

The other opinion is, that the word here 
rendered " creation " means the earth, the sea, 



nature's travail and expectancy. 131 

the birds, the fishes, the dumb brutes, and all 
things animate and inanimate, that God him- 
self has created, except man, who is contradis- 
tinguished in this chapter. 

Moses Stuart, an eminent American divine, 
holds that the first opinion is the right one, and 
that the passage should read thus : " For the 
earnest expectation of all mankind, unconverted 
mankind, waiteth for the manifestation of the 
sons of God ; for human nature was made sub- 
ject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of 
God, who subjected the same human nature in 
hope ; because human nature itself — uncon- 
verted and unsanctified human nature — shall 
be delivered from the bondage of that corrup- 
tion under which it now labours, into the 
glorious liberty of us Christians who are the 
children of God ; for we know that all mankind 
groan and travail in pain together until now; 
and not only they, but ourselves also which 
have the first-fruits of the Spirit. This is sub- 
stantially the interpretation given by Moses 
Stuart. 

The second opinion is held by Martin Luther, 
Tholuck, Hodge, and other modern writers, and 
by Chrysostom, Jerome, Theodoret, and almost 

k2 



132 nature's travail and expectancy. 

all the ancient fathers, with scarcely a single 
exception. Tims, therefore, the latter opinion 
has names of great merit attached to it. The 
paraphrase of the passage, according to the 
opinion held by these latter, "would be, "For 
the earnest expectation," literally meaning, the 
stretching out of the neck, as of one gazing 
with strained vision into the future, looking for 
something he is anxiously wishing to arrive. 
" For the earnest expectation of heaven, and 
earth, and air, and sea, and all dumb, animate, 
and inanimate nature, as wide as the region 
that the curse has covered, waiteth for the 
manifestation of Christians," who are now hid- 
den, as I shall show afterwards. For creation 
was made subject to vanity not willingly, not by 
any sin of its own, but by reason of Him who 
pronounced the curse upon it that it should 
bring forth thorns, but has laid it under the 
forelights of hope, that it shall one day blossom 
as the rose ; for even this very suffering nature 
shall shine and glow in the glorious liberty of 
the children of God, but at present the created 
earth, animate and inanimate, "groaneth and 
travaileth in pain together until now. And not 
only they, but ourselves also." 



133 

Now let me show the objections to the first 
opinion, and what seem to be clear evidences 
of the truth of the second. The great use of a 
minister of the gospel is to interpret God's 
word ; and whatever God has written for our 
instruction, it is our duty, our dignity, our 
privilege, to try and find out the true meaning 
of. Ministers of Christianity are not warranted 
in invariably selecting passages of Scripture 
which are plain, and just because they are so, 
however precious they may be : they must take 
the whole testimony of God : we are sanctified 
through the truth, through all the truth. It, 
therefore, becomes the minister of the Gospel 
to bring forth things both new and old. Inde- 
pendently of this, I attach to the passage very 
great interest ; it seems to me vocal with strains 
of the richest music — it reflects on my heart 
the brightest and the holiest hopes from afar. 
My objection to the first reading, that the 
creature here means the rational offspring of 
God or mankind, is this : Can it be said of un- 
converted men, Jew or Gentile, that they wait 
with an earnest desire for the manifestation of 
the sons of God ? Do infidels, sceptics, atheists 
believe in any such possibility as the manifesta- 



134 nature's travail axd expectancy. 

tion of the sons of God? Do they admit any 
snch article into their shrivelled creed? Do 
they believe the text vrhich predicts that they 
will thns be made manifest ? Do they indulge 
in any happy hope that they will thus, and then, 
be made manifest themselves, and sobe eventually 
happy? Can it be said, looking at mankind 
who are not interested in the Gospel, who are 
unacquainted with its blessed truths, that in 
any sense they are earnestly " stretching out 
their heads/' and looking for the advent of a 
spiritual bliss, as the fulfilment of a prediction 
which will be to them an introduction to the 
liberty and joy of the sons of God? Can it be 
said, with any degree of propriety, that the un- 
converted world is subject to sin not willingly ? 
Is it not, on the contrary, continually said in 
Scripture that they " choose not to retain God 
in their knowledge, - " that they are "wilfully 
ignorant," that they " will not come to Christ/'' 
that they are of their own will, and love, and 
purpose, alienated from God, that sin is their 
delight, that corruption is their element, and 
that they do not wish or expect that it ever will 
be better? If we converse with men of the- 
modern pantheistic school, they will tell us that 



nature's travail and expectancy. 135 

nature is now in a state of optimism — that is, 
that everything now is in the best possible 
state. What is this? what but glorifying in 
things as sin has made them, and having no 
hope of an event which is here predicted, that 
nature shall be emancipated into the glorious 
liberty of the children of God? It has been 
argued, that all men look for the manifestation 
of sons of God, just as Christ may be said to 
be " the Desire of all nations. " But the text 
of Haggai merely shows that there is a desire 
in the heart of every man, an aching want 
which Christ alone can meet and satisfy : but 
it is not necessarily taught that all nations do 
actually desire Christ; for another prophet says, 
" There is no beauty in him that men should 
desire him." It is one thing to say there is a 
desire in the human heart which the advent of 
Christ alone can satisfy and quiet ; another to 
say that all men look for an event which does 
not satisfy any desire they feel, and which, 
therefore, they must believe in, if they expect 
it : for a manifestation of the sons of God will 
satisfy no worldly desire whatever. To a Chris- 
tian alone it can be an object of hope ; to crea- 
tion the arrival of a coming event on the advent 



136 

of which it will rejoice. In the next place, let 
me ask, Can it he said with any degree of pro- 
priety, that the whole of unconverted mankind 
shall be introduced into the glorious liberty of 
the sons of God ? If this were said without any 
explanation at all, it would imply that the 
whole of mankind will be saved, and universal- 
ism would be true : but this is denied by those 
good men to whom I have alluded, and who 
take an opposite view from me; for they say 
only the last generation of mankind shall be 
introduced into the glorious liberty of the sons 
of God ; just as we say that only of the brutes 
then living shall it be true, that " The wolf shall 
dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie 
down with the kid." But according to the 
notion of those who hold this opinion, the mil- 
lennium is not to be a state of perfect happi- 
ness; but only a high degree of holiness and 
happiness, brought on by the ordinary preach- 
ing of the Gospel, and other instrumentalities 
employed by us — that the tares then shall only 
be few, and the wheat many; and, therefore, 
according to their own theory, at no period on 
earth or in time will it be true that every 
unconverted man shall be converted and ad- 



nature's travail and expectancy. 137 

mittcd into the glorious liberty of the sons of 
God. 

On these grounds this last opinion seems to 
me untenable. The Scriptures say that the 
tares and the wheat — that is, professors and the 
sons of God — shall be mixed together till the 
Lord of the harvest come himself, and separate 
the one from the other; that therefore this 
present dispensation will end in no other till 
the Lord come. 

It has been said, that it is very absurd to 
suppose that stones, and wood, and trees, and 
all dumb animals are groaning and longing for 
this introduction to glorious liberty. I answer, 
however absurd it may seem, it is in perfect 
harmony with the rest of Scripture ; for does 
not the Bible constantly speak of creation as 
sentient ? does it not say that the hills clap 
their hands ? do we not read, the valleys shall 
sing and shout for joy? is it not said, "The 
heavens declare the glory of God; and the 
firmament sheweth his handy work ?" Thus 
we see that by what is called a prosopopoeia, a 
peculiar allegory, all nature is represented 
throughout the Bible as sentient; and therefore 
the Apostle Paul, in perfect harmony with this 



138 nature's travail and expectancy. 

figure, represents all creation as now groaning 
and travailing, about to bri ag forth a new world, 
"new heavens, and a new earth/' when the old 
world and the old heavens shall be no more 
mentioned at all. In the next place, is not this 
suffering of creation round us perfectly accor- 
dant with what most men have thought to be 
the whole analogy of Scripture ? Is it not ex- 
pressly taught, that creation suffered when man 
sinned ? Is it not true that when the curse was 
pronounced on man, a corresponding curse was 
pronounced upon the earth : " Thorns also and 
thistles shall it bring forth to thee?" That 
man should fertilise the earth by the sweat of 
his brow, and water it by the tears of his weep- 
ing eyes, is the very earliest evidence of a curse 
denounced upon it. If, then, it be true that all 
creation has sympathised in its measure accord- 
ing to its nature, with rnair's sin and fall — and 
the Scriptures, I think, clearly teach so — does 
it not seem very reasonable and very natural, 
for us to expect all creation shall sympathise 
with man's recovery ? But however reasonable, 
if it were not Scriptural, I would reject it; but 
Scripture frequently and fully asserts that when 
man shall be restored and reinstated in his re- 



covered royalty, ' ( the wilderness and the solitary 
place shall be glad for them/' and " the desert 
shall rejoice and blossom as the rose;" in short, 
that all creatures, subject to man at first, shall 
be restored to that harmony, and replaced in 
those peaceful relationships, which they lost in 
consequence of man's sin. The Apostle Peter 
tells us in his Second Epistle : " But the day of 
the Lord will come as a thief in the night ; in 
the which the heavens shall pass away with a 
great noise, and the elements shall melt with 
fervent heat ; the earth also, and the works that 
are therein, shall be burned up ; " not burned 
out of existence, not annihilated — but in the 
same sense in which the phrase "the whole 
earth perished by the flood ; " that is, underwent 
a mighty change. Seeing, then, that all these 
things shall be dissolved [the word dissolved is 
applied in the Acts to the wreck of the ship in 
which St. Paul sailed separating into pieces, but 
it by no means implies the annihilation of the 
ship] , what manner of persons ought ye to be 
in all holy conversation and godliness, looking 
for and hasting unto the coming of the day of 
God, wherein the heavens being on fire shall be 
dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fer- 



140 nature's travail and expectancy 

vent heat? Nevertheless we, according to his 
promise, look for "new heavens and a new 
earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness." Then 
shall be the introduction of nature into the 
glorious liberty of the sons of God. Man 
sinned, and instantly nature suffered. Man lost 
his imiocency, and creation instantly lost its 
beauty. Is it not in perfect accordance with all 
Scripture to infer that when man, who is the 
flower and the prince of creation, its head, its 
lord, and priest, shall be restored and reinstated 
in his primal beauty — in more than his primal 
glory — that this earth, which sin smote, which 
his wickedness has marred, dismantled, and in- 
jured, shall also be restored, reinstated, and 
made beautiful, as man himself — the house and 
the inhabitant rebuilt and restored together? 
Does not this seem to be the more Scriptural, 
and not only so, but also the more probable and 
more reasonable, view? Nay, do not the two 
seem to run perfectly parallel? For instance, 
man sins; the result is, that a curse is pro- 
nounced upon him, and then a curse is pro- 
nounced upon nature. What is that primal 
curse ? All cattle are cursed : and the serpent 
above all cattle is cursed, " Cursed is the ground 



nature's travail and expectancy . 141 

for thy sake ; in sorrow shalt thou eat of it all 
the days of thy life; Thorns also and thistles 
shall it bring forth to thee ; and thou shalt eat 
the herb of the field ; in the sweat of thy face 
shalt thou eat bread, till thou return unto the 
ground." Man's primal innocence was sur- 
rounded by nature in her primal peace, happi- 
ness, and beauty ; but man sins, and in conse- 
quence of his sin he drags down nature into the 
lower climate of thistles, disquiet, rebellion. 
We find the fall of creation parallel with the 
fall of man. We may hope, nay, we are taught 
in the Bible to hope, that the restoration of 
creation shall be contemporaneous and parallel 
also with the restoration of man. Hence our 
Lord tells the Apostles that in the restoration 
they shall sit upon thrones. The word employed 
is 7raAiyy£ve<rta, that is, the new birth or regene- 
ration of all things, the time of the restitution 
of all things. Martin Luther, commenting upon 
that text, says, " The restitution of all things 
means that creation shall put off her sackcloth, 
and put on her Easter garments" — that is, 
undergo a great and a blessed change. But 
there is evidence, I think, of a still more con- 
clusive character in favour of that interpretation 



142 

of these passages, which I have indicated in such 
events as the miracles and life of our blessed 
Lord. It rests Trith the reader to weigh the 
facts I adduce, and decide whether they are 
conclusive or not. I think I see in every act of 
Jesus a foreshadow of the complete reversal of 
the curse that fell alike upon humanity and on 
the inanimate and animate creation."* Let me 
mention some of these. Adam in the garden of 
Eden sinned, Avas driven into the wilderness, 
and left there. Jesus in the wilderness tri- 
umphed, re- asserted the return of the garden, 
and gave us the earnest that Paradise shall 
again be restored. Is it a vain or an unmeaning 
coincidence that Adam in a garden fell and was 
driven into the wilderness, and that Jesus steps 
into the wilderness where Adam Avas left, regains 
the garden, and gives us the hope of Paradise 
again ? Adam was in Paradise with the beasts, 
the lion, the tiger, the lamb ; all animals in 
perfect harmony around him, recognising him 
as their lord. He sinned ; and the instant that 

* "It seems a most perplexing law, that of animals obvi- 
ously framed for the destruction of each other ; and may we 
not hope for the literal fulfilment of such a revolution as is 
set torth in these verses 1" — Chalmers' Daily Readings, vol. hi. 
p. 273. 



nature's travail and expectancy. 143 

he sinned, each animal was seized with a new 
instinct, and they have raged against him, as if 
under the force of a terrible revenge, until this 
day. 

INow, what does Mark say of Jesns ? Is 
what he so says without significance ? "J esus 
was in the wilderness with the wild beasts." 
The first Adam threw them all into rage and 
antagonism by his sin; the second Adam ap- 
peared in the midst of them, reduced them to 
concord, and gave in that wilderness, on a 
small scale, a foreshadow of that blessed re- 
storation when Nature's groans shall cease, and 
man shall again be lord of all, and all living 
things shall do him obedience. 

In the miracles of Jesus, which are recorded 
in the gospels, we have the same idea indicated 
again and again. For instance, when he multi- 
plied the bread — when he stilled the seas — 
when he hushed the winds — when he healed the 
sick — he gave, I think, not only specimens, but 
instalments of what will be. I believe that 
these miracles of Jesus were not mere displays 
of power, nor mere credentials of his Messiah- 
ship. Such they were, but more than this they 
also were ; I believe they were earnests and 



144 nature's travail and expectancy. 

prophetic auguries of that coming and blessed 
day, when creation, recovered from its bondage, 
shall be introduced into the glorious liberty of 
the children of God. Jesus seems to me to 
have been the turner back, as it were, of the 
currents of creation, which were all rushing 
away from God — the restorer in the earnest of a 
blessed and a glorious transformation of all things 
— the great Reformer of that of which he was 
once the great Creator, which he made very beau- 
tiful, and which man's sin alone made very bad. 
In the next place it seems to me — and this is 
a fact worth thinking of — that ever since Jesus 
suffered, wrought miracles, healed the sick, 
stilled the ocean, and showed his control over 
rebellious nature — by bringing it back again 
into order, — man has gained bv degrees a 
greater mastery over all things, as if then hu- 
manity received a new impulse ; and in propor- 
tion to this Christian light (I do not say 
Christianity is the cause, but it certainly is a 
coincidence) has been his civilization ; and in 
proportion to that, the gradual authority which 
he seems to be regaining over that nature, the 
reins of which he lost in Paradise, but which 
under the blessing of God, and by the appliance 



145 

Jesus has now partially, and will again com- 
pletely, put into his redeemed and sanctified 
hand. It is to me a most delightful experience 
to see any one discovery in science or in art, 
which restores to man, however slightly, the 
mastery over created things. Is it not true, 
that since Jesus healed the sick there has been 
given a greater impulse to curative science than 
ever was felt before ? Is not medicine, with 
all its defects, with all the obloquy cast upon 
it, because it cannot do everything, progressive? 
Is it not true, that some diseases, once thought 
incurable, are now almost extirpated? Small- 
pox is now, not only curable, but almost banished 
from our land. And was the discovery of this 
mode of cure simply chance ? Will you say it 
was accident ? I believe it to have been as 
much an inspiration of the God of providence 
as the Bible is an inspiration of the God of 
grace. Is it not fact, that man's life is longer 
than it was? If you do not believe me, ask 
the Insurance Societies, and they will tell you 
it is so by some six years. It is much longer 
than this, if we remember, that the sickly and 
delicate infant which was lost before, while only 
the strong ones survived, is now spared, and, 

L 



14G nature's travail and expectancy. 

of art, grows up to manhood. Is not all this 
gain? Is it not progress in the direction in 
which the miracles of Jesus lay, and in the 
reversal of that curse which "brought death 
into the world, and all our woe?" Is it not 
also true, that operations once thought per- 
fectly impossible, are now performed by our 
surgeons with safety and success ? Is not that 
recent wonderful discovery, chloroform, one of 
the most providential blessings that God has 
given us ? I look upon it as a most significant 
instalment of the reversal of the curse, stilling 
the groans and travail of the creature, an in- 
spiration from God ; and connected with the 
special curse pronounced upon Eve and her 
daughters, and read in the light of that curse, it 
is, to my mind, a beautiful earnest of what will 
be — a forelight of the approaching dawn — an 
augury of millennial days, when there shall be 
no more pain, nor tears, nor sorrow, nor crying. 
Is it not true, that since Jesus stilled the ocean, 
and hushed its rude waves, man is more the 
lord of the sea than he ever was before ? Ex- 
plain these things as you like, you must suffer 
me to view them in the light of my Bible ; and 
this light shows me, that in these the creature 



nature's travail and expectancy. 147 

itself is more and more emancipated from the 
bondage into which it was thrown by man's sin, 
into the glorious liberty of the sons of God. 
These do not bring on the millennium, but they 
are hints, intimations, auguries, foreshadows to 
man, that what God has promised in his Word, 
he will faithfully perform in his providence. 
Since Jesus re- asserted man's control over all 
nature, man is making progress more and more 
every day in doing without animal power, and 
carrying on all his designs and his intercourse, 
by subjecting inanimate nature to his govern- 
ment and control. One of the most beautiful 
sights to my mind, when I look around me in 
the world, is the fact, that the poor horse, that 
once ran, and toiled, and drudged till he died, 
often under cruel treatment, and prematurely 
under any treatment, is, to a certain extent, 
relieved from the severity of his bondage, and 
employed only for lighter work ; that now the 
inhabitant of the old world can meet the in- 
habitant of the new world in the short space 
of fourteen days ; that man can now la hold of 
the red lightnings, which were thought to be the 
exclusive prerogative of Deity, and send these 
lightnings on his errands from end to end of 
t l 2 



148 NAT cue's travail and expectancy. 

nations, and it may be soon from end to end of 

the habitable globe. Men think what others only 
dreamed of ; they do what former generations 
dimly thought of; and they glory in what 
others inadequately and imperfectly did. Are 
not these prophetic facts? Is not all this a 
convincing presumption, that creation itself shall 
be delivered from the bondage of corruption into 
the glorious liberty of the sons of God? Do 
we not see an impulse in the same direction, 
in those facts which are occurring every clay 
around us ? Is not commerce • beginning to 
teach men as policy, what Christianity has been 
teaching as a duty — that it is men's interest not 
to quarrel with each other ? Is not agriculture, 
under a new stimulus, beginning to develop 
greater energies; man says, to feed him — and 
so far it is true ; but God says, to be an augury 
of that day when the sixty- seventh Psalm shall 
be translated from prophecy into fact — when 
the (< earth shall yield her increase, and God, 
even our own God, shall bless us ?" And this 
very year, will there not be in our own great 
city, gathered from all the ends of the world, 
men skilful in science, accomplished in the 
arts, who shall bring together all the products 



nature's travail and expectancy. 149 

of all parts of tlie globe, as evidence of the stage 
of progress which humanity has reached ? Will 
not this be, in some respect, a step toward 
deciding national superiority, not by an appeal 
to the sword, which is the dire necessity, but 
by an appeal to the products of the mind ? And 
when that exposition shall take place, under a 
most gracious prince, what will be the result ? 
I can predict it. The nation that has most 
Bibles and most Christianity, will show that its 
fingers have most skill ; that its genius has the 
most inexhaustible resources ; and that the 
people that are at the head of all the nations of 
the earth in Christian light, and liberty, and 
privilege, will excel them all in most things 
besides. What are all these, then, but auguries 
and foretastes of what will be ? These will not 
bring on the millennium — I expect no such 
thing ; but I look on these as flowers gathered 
from its glorious gardens, to let us know that 
we shall see the whole ; I look on these as 
voices crying in the wilderness, reminding us of 
bright hopes, and ringing in Creation's heart : 
" You shall be delivered from the bondage of 
corruption into the glorious liberty of the chil- 
dren of God." 



150 nature's travail and expectancy. 

I know that in looking around us at creation, 
and witnessing the present state of disorder in 
which it lies, we sometimes feel as if this were 
its normal state — that creation is, as the Pan- 
theists say, just what God made it, and that it is 
far better it # should be now just as we find it ; 
for if there were no storms, nor incidents, nor 
accidents, nor tempests, men would not exert 
so much industry and energy, or come under 
so suitable a discipline. I have no doubt that 
creation in its fall is more fitted for man in his 
fall than creation in its happiness would be. 
But it is the infected house that suits the in- 
fected inhabitant ; it is the marred and dis- 
mantled home that indicates the presence of 
the criminal. Sin is the spring of all creation's 
restlessness ; it is sin that has wrecked it. It 
is because man became sinful that the earth 
became barren; it was because man lost his 
allegiance to God that nature ceased her alle- 
giance to him, and that we have war and dis- 
cord instead of peace, and creation clothed in 
sackcloth and in crape, groaning in travail and 
in pain, seeking her emancipation. But the 
restored King requires a restored kingdom. 

It is stated that nature is " subject to vanity " 



151 

and corruption. And what is meant by vanity ? 
This is meant : all things in nature, instead of 
being applied to their holy and legitimate ends, 
are employed in promoting sinful and criminal 
ends. The sun lights the thief to his spoil; 
and the moon the robber to his prey — they 
were never meant to do so. The stars guide 
the course, and the winds fill the sails, of the 
pirate-craft — they were never meant to do so. 
The earth gives gold and silver to satisfy men's 
avarice — it was never meant to do so. The 
geologist drags argument from the bowels of 
the earth, and the astronomer tears by force 
reasons from the heaven above him, to prove 
that no footsteps of a God are in the one, and 
that no glory of a God is reflected from the 
other. This was not meant to be. But what 
does it show? — that creation is subject to bond- 
age, and turned to a usage for which it was 
never intended. But it is written, it shall be 
delivered ; this is not to be its final rest. The 
earth is wearied of being a place of graves ; and 
the sun of shining upon sick-beds and tears. 
The air was not created to be breathed by 
slaves ; the fire that warms us was not designed 
to burn the martyr ; the trees of the forest and 



152 nature's travail and expectancy. 

the stones of the field were not meant to make 
a prison for an Achilli ; mnsic was not given to 
be turned into Ave Marias and Stabat Maters, 
and to yield its incense to idolatry. What is 
all this perversion of nature but its subjection 
to vanity ? What is nature's condition under 
it but groaning and travailing, and waiting to 
be delivered ? and these groans grow louder as 
the dawn of liberty grows clearer. It is re- 
corded that when the statue of Memnon was 
raised in Egypt, the instant the first rays of 
the rising sun fell upon it, it emitted beautiful 
sounds : so these groans of creation are the 
sounds it emits under the first rays of that 
coming Sun, now below the horizon, or shining 
only horizontally, but scon to ascend Ids meri- 
dian throne, and send down his vertical splen- 
dour : then all creation shall be restored, and 
Paradise regained. 

I am now showing you latent, but instructive 
harmonies ; and whenever we can show har- 
monies between God's book and God's work, 
we are casting light upon the conclusion that 
this book is from God, and enlarging our views 
to the limits of what God himself has revealed. 
It has often occurred to me (and I do not think 



nature's tratal and expectancy. 153 

it is merely fancy) that everything in nature 
seems to be pushing up, and pressing into a 
state that is better. Every one vi ill tell you, 
who has paid attention to the subject, that all 
nature seems now as if conscious of some load 
lying upon it, and anxious to heave it off, and 
to be something better than we now see it. 
Take a plant, and put on it something that will 
press it down, and hide it from the light : it 
will creep about everywhere searching for a 
crevice, and having found it, will send forth its 
blossoms in greater beauty ; as if the very plant 
felt a noble consciousness that it had gained the 
victory under circumstances so unfavcurable. 
The very stone bursts into crystal, as if try- 
ing to rise to the dignity of flowers. Look 
at the difference between the roses of the fields 
and the roses of cur gardens, and see what art 
has done. It has made the one rich and beau- 
tiful ; while sin, the curse, and the fall, have 
made the other poor and insignificant. The 
peach and apricot, r.rt's transformation of 
miserable fruits — the apple, evolved from a sour 
crab,* are all evidences of hidden possibilities of 

* The thistle is an imperfect or blasted flower, not origin 
ally created as it now is. 



154 nature's travail and expectancy. 

beauty which a millennial year will call forth. 
All this is nature pushing upward, and, by the 
appliances of man's skill, made to develop her 
hidden and greater riches. When the whole 
burden shall be lifted away, and the curse re- 
versed, the rose that we, by art and skill, have 
made so wonderfully more beautiful than it was, 
will become ten thousand times more glorious 
still. 

In every tree and plant and flower, there 
are hidden virtues that we cannot now develop, 
but which God will develop into millennial 
forests and millennial roses, and show in all a 
grandeur and a magnificence such as we have 
never yet dreamed of. Even the brute creation 
seems to me a conscious sufferer. Have you 
ever watched a dying animal — a dying horse, 
for instance ? There is something in the poor 
animal's eye, as it looks upon the master so 
pitifully, that it seems as if the animal had 
within it some dim and mysterious longing for 
a deliverance that man cannot give. The cele- 
brated German poet and philosopher, Goethe, 
who lived and died a sceptic, and whose testi- 
mony, therefore, was not meant to confirm that 
of the Bible, has said, " When I stand all alone 



155 

at night in open nature, I feel as though nature 
•were a spirit, and begged redemption of me." 
What a striking testimony to the words of Paul ! 
And again he says : " Often, often have 1 had 
the sensation as if nature, in wailing sadness, 
entreated something of me ; so that not to un- 
derstand what she longed for has cut me to the 
very heart." Do you not see that the highest 
conjectures of genius tread upon the skirts of 
what God has revealed ? and that nature, when 
left to itself, feels and owns her agony, and the 
sceptic describes her in the formulas of Scrip- 
ture, as feeling restless for deliverance, and so 
adds his testimony to the truth of God's words ? 
But I present another witness — that of a great 
and good man. Martin Luther says : " Albeit 
the creature (the dumb creature) hath not 
speech such as we have, it hath a language 
still, which God the Holy Spirit heareth and 
understandeth. How nature groaneth for the 
wrong it must endure from the ungodly who 
so misuse and abuse it I" Here we have the 
sceptic Goethe and the eminent Christian Luther 
concurring in the same thing. And the poet 
who is supposed to tread nearest to the inspired, 
says very beautifully :— 



156 



u To me they seem, 
Those far sad streaks that reach along the west, 
Like strains of song still yearning from the chords 
Of nature's orchestra. Weary, yet still 
She sinks with longing to her winter-sleep, 
Dreams ever of that birth for whose bright dawn 
The whole creation groans. Fair, sad companion ! 
I join my sigh with thine. — Yet none can be 
Our sigh's interpreter, but that great God 
Who breathes eternal wisdom, made, redeem'd, 
And loves us both, and ever moves as erst 
On thy dark waters' face." 

Another poet has written : — 

K Live not the stars and mountains ? Are the waves 

Without a spirit ? Are the dropping caves 
Without a feeling in their silent tears \ " 

Such are testimonies confirmatory of the 
conclusion to which I have here come. 
r* It seems, then, that we may indulge the hope 
that all nature shall be delivered. Gold and 
silver shall no longer beautify the shrines of 
idols, nor gratify the miser's avarice. The 
tongue and the pen — those mighty engines of 
good or evil, shall become the priests of God 
and the ministers of holiness. Music shall be 
lifted from its degradation, and made to magnify 
and praise God, its key-note Christ. Eve-:y 
star shall point to the Morning Star; every 
flower, to the Rose of Sharon ; every stock and 



157 

every stone, to the Rock of Ages. The ocean 
shall mirror forth His brightness, and the chimes 
of the waves and the rush of the wind shall 
tell forth the glory of Him who made and sus- v 
tains them. 

But all this, we are told, is coincident with 
another fact, and a fact that most intensely 
interests us ; namely, " the manifestation of the 
sons of God." The language of the Apostle is, 
that the earnest expectation of creation waiteth 
for " the manifestation of the sons of God." 
Human nature groans, waiting for the adoption 
which we long for, to wit, "the redemption of 
our body/' This is the ultimate event, the 
revelation of which will be coeval with the 
restoration of all creation; for it is said that 
whenever God's sons shall be manifest, God's 
creation shall be glorified. What then is meant 
by the manifestation of the sons of God ? I 
answer, we should ascertain first what is meant 
by their being hidden. " They shall be mani- 
fest," implies they are now hidden. But if this 
were only an implication, 1 would not dwell on 
it, but the Apostle John says, " The world 
knoweth us not, as it knew not Christ. It doth 
not yet appear what we shall be, but we know 



158 nature's travail and expectancy. 

tliat when Christ shall appear, we shall be like 
him, that is, be manifested, for then we shall 
see him as he is." In what respect are Chris- 
tians now hidden? I answer, Our life, as the 
Apostle says, is hid with Christ in God; our 
nutriment is hidden manna ; the springs of our 
joy and the sources of our grief, the elements 
of our victory, are facts that the world does not 
appreciate, and that it cannot understand : for 
instance, the beauty that is peculiar to a true 
Christian is a beauty that others cannot under- 
stand. A worldly man admires the beauty of a 
cathedral, the splendour of the Pantheon, the 
grandeur of the Pyramids, gorgeous robes, sen- 
suous rites, brilliant ceremonies ; but he cannot 
understand that inner, but infinitely more 
glorious beauty, the beauty of holiness, " the 
King's daughter all gorious within" 

The source of a Christian's holiness is en- 
tirely hidden to the world : the world cannot 
understand why he should be more holy, more 
pure, more just, more upright than it is; it 
cannot understand how salvation by grace can 
be separated from license to sin ; how I can be 
saved without works, and yet fail to live without 
morality. It supposes that salvation without 



nature's travail and expectancy. 159 

works must necessarily be a life without holi- 
ness ; but we can explain it, if the world will 
understand the explanation, in this way. A 
Christian has perfect power to sin; he has a 
tongue that may speak evil, an eye that may 
accept improper impressions, feet to go, and 
hands that can shed blood, but he does not do 
any of these things. We do not say that a 
man who has become a Christian is denuded of 
his power to sin, but that he has lost his taste 
or his liking for sin. For instance, a good 
musician could compose bad music, and play 
very badly on an instrument, but still he does 
not do so. He has fingers that can write badly, 
or touch the key-notes clumsily, but yet they 
do not. Why ? Not from want of power, but 
because his cultivated and consummate taste 
keeps him from doing so. Again, a mother 
might throw her babe into the Thames. She 
has a hand to act, she has feet to walk, power 
to do it, but she does not. Why ? Because 
she has an inner affection that restrains her 
from doing so. A Christian, in the same man- 
ner, has the physical power to sin, just as any 
other person has, and he may steal, commit 
adultery, or he may kill; but he does not. 



Why? Because the same gospel that delivers 
him from the practice of sin, delivers him from 
the preference of sin also. But this which to 
us is all beauty, harmony, and joy, is to the 
world all mystery, because the manifestation 
of God's sons is a future thing ; the hiding of 
God's sons is the present actual thing. In the 
same manner, the sources of a Christian's joy 
are now all hidden and mysterious; they are all 
a mystery to the world. The world cannot 
understand how you can feel joy without the 
opera once a week, and the play-house twice, 
and the card- table occasionally ; the world 
cannot understand how you can be a happy 
man, and yet not plunge into all the dissipa- 
tions, the excitement, the stimulating follies, of 
a scene passing away. The world cannot un- 
derstand it. Why? Because your life is hid 
with Christ in God ; the manifestation will be ; 
the secret, or hidden life, now is. But even to 
a worldly man, we might illustrate this. One 
says, ' ' I wonder you can sit ten minutes listen- 
ing to the Messiah of Handel." My answer is, 
" God has given me a susceptibility that you 
have not." Another wonders how you can gaze 
with joy on the Crucifixion, or the Descent from 



the Cross, by Rubens, or spend days in painting 
that old tree, or sketching that beautiful land- 
scape. You answer, " I have a taste and a 
susceptibility of pleasure from this, that God 
has not given to you." A mathematician once 
read Milton's "Paradise Lost," from beginning 
to end, and he said it was worthless, because it 
demonstrated nothing. Why did he say so ? 
God has bestowed on others a taste that he has 
withheld from that mathematician. And when 
a Christian derives joy from self- sacrifice, from 
prayer, from the privileges and the duties of 
Christianity, it is because God has given to the 
regenerate a taste and a susceptibility of joy of 
a kind that he has not given to the natural 
man; therefore a natural man has no more idea 
of the secret and spring of a Christian's joy 
than a blind man has of light, or a deaf man of 
sound. The Christian's life is hidden now : the 
manifestation will be. Again, Christians in this 
dispensation are often hid by persecution, cr by 
the lowliness of their circumstances. The most 
eminent Christian m^y li/e in a cellar, and he 
may appear to be less Christian than a far less 
advanced Christian who occupies a place of 
eminence. God judges Christianity by what 

M 



162 nature's travail and expectancy. 

the heart would do ; man judges by what the 
hand can do. But one may have great benevo- 
lence, but not have the means of beneficence; 
and therefore such a one is hidden from the 
world. 

" Full many a gem of purest ray serene, 

The dark unfathomed caves of ocean bear ; 
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen, 
And waste its sweetness in the desert air." 

Christians, in this dispensation, are hidden 
by their own internal imperfections. Never let 
us forget, that essential Christian character is 
compatible with many lamentable imperfections. 
And when we see in another the fault that we 
are least inclined to, it requires much grace in 
us to admit that such a one is a Christian. 
Never, therefore, let us forget that grace sub- 
dues — it does not extirpate human idiosyncrasy. 
Peter remained, after his conversion, what he 
was before, as to his personal temperament : 
grace repressed, not exterminated, his passion. 
In that rough casket there may be a precious 
jewel ; under that violent temper there may 
slumber calm and beautiful depths of Christian 
love ; and in that rude and apparently unculti- 
vated man, there may be a spirit still as the 



163 

stars, and beautiful as God can make it. We 
need, in judging of each other, more light, and 
still more charity. Besides, Christians are often 
hidden by the peculiar way in which their cha- 
racter is developed. Grace acts in different 
ways. In one man it speaks ; in another man 
it is silent ; in another man it is still. In one 
man grace has so much to do with the inner 
work of crucifying the works of the flesh, that 
there is scarcely time for the outer work ; in 
another man the inner work is nearly done, or 
much advanced, and he has much time for the 
outer work of making his friends Christians, 
and enriching them with the grace he himself 
has. You must not, therefore, conclude that he 
is not a Christian who does nothing externally, 
or that he is most a Christian who does much 
externally, but recollect that each, if a believer, 
has his own specific mission, and to that mission 
duty ought to restrict and confine him. 

Thus, then, Christians are hidden; their life 
is hid, their grace is hidden, their peace is hid- 
den; the world knoweth them not, it cannot 
understand them ; but we are told the day comes 
when there shall be the manifestation, or liter- 
ally, the apocalypse (for that is the word) of the 

m2 



164 nature's travail and expectancy. 

sons of God. Then shall be true what God 
himself hath said : " And they shall be mine, 
saith the Lord of Hosts, in that day when I 
make np my jewels :" they shall shine and 
sparkle like jewels in the crown of our Lord, 
or, as it is stated by our Lord himself, when he 
speaks in the Gospel of St. Matthew: "And 
before Him shall be gathered all nations : And 
He shall separate them one from another, as a 
shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats : 
and he shall set the sheep on his right hand, 
but the goats on the left." Then God's sons 
will be manifest, clearly and unequivocally so, 
as it is stated by John in his Epistle : " Beloved, 
now are we the sons of God; and it doth not 
yet appear what we shall be ; but we know that 
when he shall appear, we shall be like him ; for 
we shall see him as he is." But in the mean 
time what does he say ? " The world knoweth 
us not, because it knew him not." What har- 
mony between Malachi, Matthew, Paul, and 
John ? What evidence that they had but one 
key-note, one capital to be drawn on — but one 
Redeemer to be directed by ! 

Now, the instant that the sons of God are 
manifest, creation shall experience a new and 



165 

glorious genesis ; its groans shall be transposed 
into songs, its sufferings into joy, its restlessness 
into true and perpetual peace. Are you, reader, 
for our deepest interest lies here, a son of God ? 
Can you say from the very heart, " Abba, 
Father V Are you among those of whom the 
apostle says, " The Spirit itself beareth witness 
with our spirit that we are the children of 
God?" — For the apostle always associates the 
personal privilege with the surrounding glory. 
Is that true of you? "And if children, then 
heirs f and if we suffer with Christ, we shall 
be glorified together. And the sufferings which 
we now endure, hidden, disguised, persecuted, 
maligned, misrepresented, are not worth think- 
ing about, when we reflect on the glory which 
shall be revealed. For creation suffers with us ; 
and creation shall be emancipated with us. 
Can you then say — " Our Father, which art in 
heaven?" Can you pray the Lord's prayer? 
A child can repeat it, the Romanist can mutter 
it twenty times upon his beads ; a parrot might 
be taught to talk it • human lips may utter it ; 
but only a heart that has been regenerated by 
the Holy Spirit of God can pray it. It is easy 
to say prayers ; anybody can do thi3 : it is only 



Christians who can pray prayers; the sons of 
God alone can do this. Are yon, then, my 
reader, a son of God ? This is a very momen- 
tous question. It is a question that must not 
be left unsettled. You ought to take it home to 
your hearts, and honestly look it in the face, 
and settle it in the sight of God, and in the 
prospect of the judgment-seat. 

" It is not, then, a poet's dream, 
An idle vaunt of song ; 
Such as beneath the moon's soft gleam 
On vacant fancies throng, 

" Which bids us see, in heaven and earth 
In all fair things around, 
Strong yearnings for a blest new birth 
With sunless glories crowned." 






CHAPTER VI. 

THE CHRISTIAN'S AGONY AND HOPE. 

The head that God breaks with affliction's stroke, 
Oft, like the flower when stricken by the storm, 
Rises from earth more steadfastly to turn 
Itself to heaven, whither as a guide, 
Kindly though stern, affliction still is leading, 
Even to the home of endless joy and peace. 
Here, on the borders of that better land, 
Shall Pain's sharp ministry for ever cease. 
Then shall we bless Thee safely landed there, 
And know above how good thy teachings were. 
Then feel thy keenest strokes to us in love were given, 
That hearts most crushed on earth shall most rejoice in 
heaven. 

"And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the first- 
fruits of the spirit, even we ourselves groan within our- 
selves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption 
of the body." — Rom. viii. 23. 

I have endeavoured to show, that the whole 
state of the created world is at this moment 
a state of suffering — lightened, I admit, by 
gleams of hope, and alleviated occasionally by 
counter- visitations, joys, and consolations ; but 
that if we look into the earth as a Avhole, we 
shall find it misused and abused ; if we look at 



168 the christian's agony and hope. 

dumb animals, we find them treated as they 
were never meant to be ; if at the flowers and 
fruits of the earth, they have lost their Eden 
bloom, and have not regained that which is 
promised. In other words, we have the fact 
streaming into our minds by every avenue and 
from all points of the compass, from the height 
and from the depth, from all around us, from 
animate and inanimate nature, that some dire 
stroke has smitten the world, and that under 
that dire catastrophe it is fevered, restless, and 
i:i agony. But to give us comfort in the midst 
of all this, we are told by Scripture, that crea- 
tion, thus suffering, shall not suffer for ever; 
that it is subjected to vanity, but it is in hope ; 
and that it shall be delivered from its present 
state ; its groans shall be transposed into songs ; 
its sufferings shall be turned into rejoicings; 
and as the world began with Paradise, the world 
shall end with Paradise, when all things shall 
be beautiful as at the first, and more so, for 
redemption shall exceed creation in its gran- 
deur and its magnificence. 

I noticed that the very term " nature," natura 
(from nascor), means about to be born; and 
that, therefore, when we say "nature," we 



THE CHRISTIAN^ AGONY AND HOPE. 169 

mean that this whole creation is groaning and 
travailing in pain ready to give birth to a new 
one — what new one ? ' ' The new heavens and 
the new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness •" 
distinguished from the earth that now is, as 
our bodies, when raised from the graves, will 
be distinguished from the bodies that now are 
— the same bodies, but infinitely more glorious 
and beautiful. 

And now, says the Apostle — not only does 
nature groan, or, to use another expression, not 
only is nature in pain, desirous of delivery — 
seeking to put on her glorious vestments — what 
Martin Luther called her Easter robes ; but we 
also, who are Christians, are likewise suffering 
and enduring great pain till we be presented 
with our new vestments — our Easter robes — 
namely, the adoption which now is, in its full- 
ness; and the redemption, or recovery of the 
body, which will be. 

We are here taught, first of all, that Chris- 
tians have a peculiar privilege — namely, the 
first-fruits of the Spirit ; secondly, that they 
are now in a painful state, groaning, or in pain, 
" waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemp- 
tion of the body ;" and, thirdly, that they may 



170 THE CHRISTIANAS AGONY AND HOPE. 

entertain a blessed hope — namely, that that 
adoption shall be theirs in its fulness, and that 
redemption of the body shall assuredly take 
place. We have these three leading thoughts 
clearly indicated in the words I have taken 
from Paul's Epistle to the Romans. 

Let me turn your attention to the fact — that 
Christians have something which is here called 
the " first-fruits of the Spirit." What is meant 
by these ? In Deuteronomy (xxvi. 1, 2) we are 
told : " When thou art come in unto the land 
which the Lord thy God giveth thee for an 
inheritance, and possessest it, and dwellest 
therein, that thou shalt take the first of all the 
fruit of the earth, which thou shalt bring of thy 
land that the Lord thy God giveth thee, and 
shalt put it in a basket, and shalt go unto the 
place which the Lord thy God shall choose to 
place his name there." It is here a first-fruits, 
or a portion of the produce of the land, pro- 
duced as an earnest of the whole. The same 
thing is mentioned in Leviticus. We read, also, 
of the fruits of the Spirit. In order to know 
what the first-fruits are, it is right to know 
what the whole fruits are. If we wish to know 
•what the first-fruits of a harvest must have been, 



THE CHRISTIAN^ AGONY AND HOPE. 171 

we must first ascertain what the nature of the 
whole product of the harvest was. We read, 
that the fruits of the Spirit are "love, joy, 
peace, long-suffering, meekness, temperance, 
gentleness, goodness, faith." Then, assuredly, 
the first-fruits of the Spirit must be some of 
these, it may be in perfection, and others of 
these, it may be, in imperfection : but all bear- 
ing a certain likeness and proportion to the 
grand harvest which is the fruit of the vintage, 
and the harvest of the world; when believers 
shall be gathered from amid the tares left be- 
hind, and introduced to the rest that remaineth 
for the people of God. We also read, in the 
Epistle to the Corinthians, that the Lord Jesus 
is " the first-fruits of them that sleep." It may 
be that the Apostle alludes to this; and that by 
the first-fruits of the Spirit he may also indicate 
that presentiment, that earnest within us, by 
the Spirit of God, of the redemption or recovery 
of our body. But I incline to think it is the 
prior one — namely, that in this world a believer 
has some measure of joy, of peace, of gentle- 
ness, of goodness, and of faith, the creation of 
the Spirit, as a first-fruit: as if it were a sheaf 
cut down and produced, to show what will be 



the joyful harvest of blessedness, what the air 
we shall breathe, the light we shall see, and the 
happiness we shall feel, in that future world into 
which we long to be admitted. 

The first-fruits must be that measure of con- 
formity to Christ, those bright truths, and those 
blessed hopes which a Christian now is privi- 
leged to entertain ; a sheaf of the golden har- 
vest; a cluster, like the grapes of Eshcol, to 
show, in the wilderness of this world, how fer- 
tile, how rich, how beautiful the productions of 
the better land are ; a streak, as it Avere, of the 
morning dawn, to show us, as that dawn gilds 
the mountain tops, how bright and glorious is 
that better day that spreads beyond the hills, 
where is gentleness and goodness, and happi- 
ness, and peace, for ever. Thus, then, Chris- 
tians have a first-fruits, or an earnest of the 
glory and happiness, or the harvest, that is to 
be at the end. 

This fact, so very plain, teaches a lesson, 
which it is important to notice, namely, that 
we must know something of heaven upon 
earth, if we are destined to know anything of 
heaven hereafter. It is the greatest mistake 
in the world to suppose that man may live here 



173 

as lie likes, and yet is sure to drift into heaven, 
if lie will only let the waters and currents of 
society carry him as they will. Such is not the 
teaching of God. The contrary is. We are 
taught plainly in this blessed Book, that the 
man who will be admitted into heaven here- 
after, must have a portion of heaven admitted 
into his heart in this present life; in other 
words, that he must have the first-fruits before 
he shall reap the full harvest ; that the people 
are prepared for the place that is prepared for 
them. By what we now are, we may ascertain 
what and where we shall be hereafter. The 
spring from which we draw our joy and our 
happiness now, is fed from the sea of bitterness 
and misery that overwhelms the lost, or from 
the ocean of purity, and love, and joy, which 
rolls for ever in the presence of God and of the 
Lamb. 

It cannot, then, be said, if these thoughts be 
true, as they can be unquestionably proved, that 
he is in the way to heaven in whose heart the 
world is all, — whose supreme aim and object 
are the acquisition of money, and wealth, and 
greatness. These things may occupy their place; 
but it is a very low one; the better and the 



174 

brighter world should be first in our heart, and 
chief in our pursuit. We do not bid any cease 
to labour, or to have any love for money ; but 
it must be a love in its place, and according to 
its worth, and far below a love infinitely supe- 
rior — the love of the unsearchable riches of 
Christ. We do not bid any cease to admire the 
beautiful flower, or inhale its fragrance, or taste 
of the innocent joys of the world as they pass 
through ; all we ask is, that you would pause 
only for an instant to do so. We are strangers 
and pilgrims, looking for our home, which is 
beyond the stars, and for which we must be 
made fit in this present world. Let me ask 
you, reader, Have you the first-fruits of the 
Spirit ? Do you know what it is to be joyful, 
— to be happy, as Christians are? Do you 
know by practical experience, that Christianity 
is meant to make men happy? that no man can 
be so happy as a Christian ? and that no man 
can be happy, in the right S2nse of the word — 
having that happiness which fills the whole soul, 
and gives it perfect repose — who. does not know 
that his sins are forgiven, through a Saviour's 
sacrifice, and his heart renewed by a Saviour's 
Spirit ? and that, whether he is smitten down 



THE CHRISTIANAS AGONY AND HOPE. 175 

by sudden death, or lingers in protracted sick- 
ness, in his case severance from the body is 
admission into joy unutterable and full of glory ? 

Let me ask, dear reader, the very important 
question, Do you think of the solemn truths 
of the Bible ? Do you read and study it, as 
a man in earnest ? If you were about to take 
possession of a large estate, would you not 
read its title-deeds ? Would you not study its 
nature, the contents of its soil, its trees, its 
flowers, its products ? Can we be on the way 
to heaven, and under influences from above, if 
we take no interest in the nature of heaven? 
Can I be — I appeal to conscience — in the way 
that leads to heaven, if I never think of it, or 
pray in the prospect of it, or study the Book 
that portrays it, or ask God by his Holy 
Spirit to guide me to it ? 

Such as these are the fruits of the Spirit — 
such are the characteristics of those who are 
groaning within themselves, waiting for the 
adoption. Let us now inquire, What is the 
pain that believers feel in a world disordered 
and out of course ? 

The very first ground of a Christian's pain 
must be the consciousness of his own sin. 



176 the christian's agony and hope. 

Who has the greatest sense of sin within him ? 
The man who has the clearest apprehension of 
God, who has made the greatest attainment in 
conformity to the character of God. The more 
light we have, the more unworthy we see our- 
selves ; so much so, that he who stands upon 
the loftiest pinnacle of Christian attainment, 
evermore bows his spirit lowliest in the very 
dust, and cries from the heart, " God be mer- 
ciful to me a sinner, unclean, unclean ! " The 
Apostle Paul, when he w r as first converted, 
said : — " I am not worthy to be called an 
apostle ; " when he made greater progress in 
Christianity, he said : " I am the least of 
saints ; " but just before he died, when his 
views of heaven were brightest, and his know- 
ledge of himself the clearest, he exclaimed : 
" I am the chief of sinners." Great know- 
ledge makes scholars humble; great holiness 
will make great Christians humble also. Wher- 
ever we see an humble man, we have reflected 
in the humility of that man, the shadow of a 
great man, for true greatness is ever humble; 
littleness is ever conceited, and full of itself. 
The greatest saint will always be the last to 
boast of himself- — he will be the most humble 



177 

before God and man. The Apostle Panl de- 
scribes his sense of sin in his own experience, 
when he says : " I see another law in my 
members, warring against the law of my mind, 
and bringing me into captivity to the law of 
sin ; " so that " the good that I would I do 
not : but the evil which I would not, that I 
do." " Oh wretched man that I am! who shall 
deliver me from the body of this death ? " This 
is the picture of the Apostle Paul : he too was 
groaning within himself, waiting to be delivered. 
A Christian has, as it were, two experiences : 
he has one state in which he groans, waiting 
and longing to be delivered; and he has an- 
other state in which he tastes the first-fruits of 
the joy that is to be revealed, and is perfectly 
happy. Thus the first reason why we are dis- 
tressed, is a sense of sin within ourselves. 

But a second ground of a Christian's pain 
lies in what he sees around him. Jeremiah was 
so distressed by what he saw, that he cried: 
" Oh that my head were waters, and mine eyes 
a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and 
night I" David himself said, that the tears ran 
down his face because men kept not God's law. 
Enlightened Christians cannot look around them 

N 



178 the christian's agony and hope. 

on the world, and see children growing up with- 
out education — or subjected, in other cases, to 
an education exhausted of what should be its 
chief element, religion, or instinct with a cor- 
rupt and superstitious religion — without being 
grieved and vexed. Do we not see on all sides 
the rich, not doing what is simply requisite to 
their just dignity, but wasting in needless ex- 
travagance the wealth that they possess ? Do 
we not see the poor envious of the rich, becom- 
ing exasperated, sometimes most wickedly, but 
most naturally, against them, and wishing that 
they could sweep them away ? Do we not 
witness pride in one quarter, and rebellion and 
insurrection in another ? Do we not see beside 
us the victims of sin, and crime, and wickedness, 
and its patrons too? in other quarters, an in- 
tense thirst for making money, and getting 
rich, to which everything that is noble, gene- 
rous, elevating, intellectual, and moral, is sacri- 
ficed, and made to give way? Sabbaths are 
not hallowed as they were, and increase of 
superstition and scepticism is too evident in 
many quarters. Are not men passing at the 
rate of a thousand per week, in this metropolis 
alone, into the future world, who — to speak in 



179 

the most charitable terms — do not give strong 
evidence that they have the first-fruits of the 
Spirit, and are the children of God ? If Chris- 
tians see such things, they must be vexed. If 
we see them, and are unaffected by the sight, 
there is something wrong in our nature ; and 
if we be grieved as we see these things, we must, 
if Christians indeed, make an effort to arrest 
and stay them. Do we not find, in looking 
from the world into the church, only greater 
sin, because committed in greater light ? Do 
we not see that universal church — for I take 
every section of it — that was raised up by God 
to roll back the torrent of corruption, becoming 
itself cold, careless, ungodly : many ministers 
preaching another gospel, and practising another 
Christianity ; disputes, divisions, and separation 
in every part of the church, till its strength is 
utterly wasted in internal fever, instead of being 
expended in beneficence, in missionary devoted- 
ness, in sacrifice ? Do we not see forms super- 
seding godliness ; men beginning to think that 
their obligation to Christ can be repaid in cere- 
monies, and their duties to mankind in rubrics, 
and charity finding its proper expression, not in 
disinterested and generous sacrifice, but in say- 

n 2 



180 

ing, " Go, and be clothed, be warmed," while 
they do not give the things that are requisite ? 
Can a Christian help feeling grieved when such 
things stare him in the face ? Is it, therefore, 
strange that the Apostle should say : " We 
Christians groan within ourselves ; are distressed 
by what takes place around us : and long, under 
the pressure of that distress, for the adoption, 
to wit, the redemption of the body ?" 

Not only does a Christian become distressed 
at what he sees in the world of rational men, 
and in the church of professing Christian men, 
but also by what he sees in the irrational world 
around him. St. Paul tells us that creation 
groans and travails. The restlessness of all 
things, disorder, suffering, confusion, depress 
and grieve the believer as he looks and listens. 
When we see the sun and moon lighting the 
murderer to his victim, and the robber to his 
spoil, we must be grieved that luminaries made 
for such beneficent purposes are used for such 
vile ones. When we see, again, the wind and 
the wave lending their energies to the slave-ship 
— the earth yielding its gold to feed avarice, and 
to form idols: when we see architecture, music, 
painting, statuary, contributing their resources 






•ire christian's agony and hope. 181 

to superstition, and not to pnre and undefiled 
religion — universities and schools teaching what 
is positively false, or, what I think is not less 
dangerous, leaving out religion in their teaching 
altogether, as if the experiment had to be made 
whether the world can be worked without reli- 
gion, and mankind cohere without God ; when 
we look around us, and see genius of the highest 
stamp expending its strength in order to con- 
struct contemptible jokes, or gilding iniquity in 
order to make it popular, or injuring precious 
institutions in order to destroy them ; when we 
see the press infected in many of its lowest 
parts with the vilest insubordination, infidelity, 
wickedness, and sympathy with sin — and power 
allied to what is evil, instead of being allied to 
what is good — Christians must be grieved : 
they cannot but bemoan such facts : they cannot 
but long and pray for the day when all this 
shall cease ; they cannot each help saying — 

" Mine ear is pain'd, 
My soul is siek with every day's report 
Of wrong and outrage with which earth is fill'd. 

***** 

Lands intersected by a narrow frith 
Abhor each other ; mountains interposed 
Make enemies of nations, who had else, 
Like kindred drops, been mingled into one." 



182 the christian's agony and hope. 

If this be so, one cannot but mourn over it, 
and long for that blessed day when the Maker 
of the world shall become the Reformer of the 
world, and shall set to right all things that are 
now out of course. 

Christians must lament and grieve at the 
persecutions which they are doomed to bear. 
If a person now avow honestly that he believes 
the Bible, that he looks chiefly for a better 
world, that he dare not be dishonest because 
he fears God, that he dare not commit sin 
because Christ died for him, how many would 
laugh, or call him fanatical or superstitious ! 
If another say, " I do not choose to go to 
places where I think Christianity, my Chris- 
tianity at least, cannot be improved ; I do not 
choose to go where the obscene joke will be 
uttered, and the obnoxious inuendo will be 
made, because I think that on me and my chil- 
dren it may inflict contaminating evil, he will 
be told by the thoughtless, the worldly, and 
unthinking : " You are a [Methodist ; you are a 
saint ; you are a person over-righteous." It is 
not over-righteousness — it is duty. The for- 
mula of persecution may be changed from the 
faggot and wild beasts into a sneer, ridicule, or 



THE CHRISTIANAS AGONY AND HOPE. 183 

contempt : but it is still true, not because I 
think so, but because God says so : " The carnal 
mind is enmity against God ; " and, " In the 
world ye shall have tribulation." We must 
expect that duty will be still set in sacrifice. 
When I have sometimes told men, " It is your 
duty to stand by this, or your duty to maintain 
that," they have said : " Oh, if we do so, we 
shall meet with this opposition, we shall have 
this and that trouble." Trouble, suffering, loss, 
are the penalties that men must pay in this 
world for the discharge of duty; and the man 
who will not stand by duty because it is set in 
trial and in conflict, never read our blessed 
Master's story, nor tasted of our blessed Mas- 
ter's spirit. Duty is the highest thing; all else 
must yield to it. Do not say : " I cannot do it, 
because I am situated here, or situated there." 
We have nothing under heaven to do with 
circumstances, but to conquer them ; we have 
nothing to do with opposition, but to meet 
and master it. Whatever God in his providence 
points out to be duty, face it in God's strength ; 
be strong; yea, be strong, as the angel said to 
Daniel, and you will conquer. To do good and 
to communicate, forget not; for with such 



184 

sacrifices (and they are so in this world) God is 
well pleased. 

Can we look aronnd ns in the circle of our 
friends and relatives, without seeing much to 
grieve and vex us — losses, sicknesses, sorrow, 
pain, bereavement, widowhood, orphanage ? 
Will any man tell me that the world moves 
just as God made it ? Is it possible to conclude, 
as some have concluded conscientiously enough, 
that the world is at its maximum of happiness ? 
that the horse in the omnibus is in the full en- 
joyment of all he was meant to have? Can any 
one say that our circles of friends and relatives 
are just what they were originally meant to be? 
or that God designed that the lion should devour 
the lamb, that the hawk should destroy the 
lark, or the bird that sings in ecstasy in the 
sunshine ? Is this natural ? We call it natural, 
because we are accustomed to it ; but it is not 
the normal state of the world : it is a state of 
disease. A man who has walked all his life 
with crutches, thinks it perfectly natural that 
he should do so; he who has been blind all 
his life, has no idea of light, and thinks he is 
in the normal or natural state ; we are so much 
accustomed to a world out of course, that we 



think it is also in its natural state. Sin pierced 
the world to its core, when it fell npon it like a 
foul blot • and it has convulsed it ever since ; 
and there is not a thing upon the earth, not a 
pain in the human body, not a loss in the 
family circle, that does not tell us that sin has 
entered, and, if we be Christians, that does not 
make us long for that day when sin, the pro- 
lific parent, shall be utterly destroyed, and 
head- aches, and heart- aches, and tears, and 
sorrows, the progeny of sin, shall be put away 
for ever. 

We grieve, and are vexed within ourselves, 
because of the obscurity of our views, even in 
things we partially see. How is it that Chris- 
tians differ from each other ? How is it that 
we differ sometimes on the meaning of the 
same passage — though not in essential things — 
and that the principles we do know, we know 
so imperfectly ? Are we not conscious at times 
of wishing we could see that truth, and harmon- 
ise this difficulty, in a way which we cannot do 
now ? Our present experience is, that the 
greatest light is always in the neighbourhood 
of the darkest shadow. The principles that we 
do know we find bring up a number of other 



186 the christian's agony and hope. 

principles that we do not know. We have no 
sooner brought one truth within the horizon, 
than a train of dark and mysterious ones follow; 
so much so, that the known is only the vestibule 
of the unknown ; and the more we know, the 
more we find remains still to be known. At all 
this we cannot help being grieved and vexed, 
and longing more earnestly for the perfect day 
in which what we now see "through a glass 
darkly/' we shall see " face to face." 

Another cause why Christians grieve within 
themselves — though it may seem strange, yet it 
is true — is the foretaste they have of the better 
world. The light that shines upon them from 
the skies, makes them long to see that light 
fully : the snatches of the harmonies of heaven 
that sometimes break upon their ears, make 
them long for the glorious jubilee into which 
they shall one day be ushered • so much so, that 
they can say often with the poet — 

K There is a land of pure delight, 
Where saints immortal reign ; 
Eternal day excludes the night, 
And pleasures banish pain ; " 

And they wish with him that they could make 
that land theirs, and cross speedily the flood 
that reaches between. 



THE CHRISTIANAS AGONY AND HOPE. 187 

Such is a brief sketch of a Christian's sorrow 
in the midst of this world. Let me close this 
chapter by looking at the object of his hope — 
" the adoption/' as it is here called, to wit, the 
redemption of the body." Let ns study these 
two as separated, and then as united. 

Adoption, as it is called in the admirable 
Shorter Catechism, is an act of God's grace, 
or of God's Spirit, by which he admits us into 
the number and fellowship of the sons of God ; 
or, to quote the Bible, " To as many as received 
him, to them gave he power to become the sons 
of God ; " or, as it is here said, " Ye have not 
received the spirit of bondage again to fear; 
but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, 
whereby we cry, Abba, Father." In ancient 
times adoption was thus distinguished. When 
a Roman husband who had no children, wished 
to adopt a child, he first adopted him privately 
—that was the dictate of affection; he then, by 
a public act, adopted him openly, and the child 
became, for all civil purposes, his son, the in- 
heritor of his property, and the bearer of his 
name. Now, the Apostle's argument here is, 
that we Christians have already had the private 
adoption of God's grace, by which we are made 



188 the christian's agony and hope. 

his children: but what we long for is the public 
adoption, which he calls in another place " the 
manifestation of the sons of God ;" when those 
not known to be the sons of God by the world, 
but who are really so, shall be seen to be God's 
sons, by soul and body being united and mani- 
fested as such on the right hand of the Judge. 

Here, then, we have, first of all, the beautiful 
idea that we are the sons of God. I know 
nothing so sublime as the prayer that Jesus 
taught his people — "Our Father." What an 
ennobling thino- is it that I can kneel in the 
presence of that God who fills all space, and 
covers the universe with His glory, and say to 
Him, "My Father," " Our Father \" I wonder 
how any one can live with a sense of a God 
who is terrible and awful, and without the sense 
of a God who is " Our Father ! " When I have 
gone into some country of mountains, and 
cataracts, and streams, and rivers — of hills and 
valleys ; when I have looked at the stupendous 
crags, and mountains, and rocks — I am stating 
one experience, and in stating that, I have no 
doubt I state yours — I have felt how insig- 
nificant I was amid those sublime apostles of 
creation, the great mountains, the everlasting 



THE CHRISTIAN'S AGONY AND HOPE. 189 

hills ; I have felt as if I were an atom in the 
universe, — a leaf in the forest, ready to be 
crushed before the moth. But as- I felt so, 
the blessed thought that my Bible taught me 
recurred to me: "My Father made all, and I 
am his child; nay, so truly so, that each hair 
on my head is counted by him, each grain of 
sand in my hour-glass is numbered and noted 
by him, — and I am not lost in the immensity 
of creation \ I am not an atom ■ I am not a 
leaf amid all this great panorama of grandeur 
and magnificence! — I am greater and nobler 
than them all, for I am the son of God, and He 
is my Father." It is thus, then, whenever I 
am awed and overwhelmed by what 1 see, that 
I fall back upon what I believe, " My Father." 
Have you ever noticed, in looking at a mother 
with a child in her bosom, that, when a stranger 
happens to be introduced, the child, on first 
glancing at him, turns away its face, and buries 
its head in its mother's bosom, and after an 
interval looks at the stranger again ? Why so ? 
It rushed back to the bosom of its mother, to 
gain strength from her, whom the child knows 
and loves, in order to bear the sight of the un- 
known, whom it dreads. Let the children of 



190 THE CHRISTIANAS AGONY AND HOPE. 

God act thus : when awed, and overwhelmed, 
and startled, let ns fall back npon the bosom 
of our Father, where we shall find consolation, 
peace, and strength; and thus we shall gaze 
upon the height and the depth, the awful and 
the terrible, and have perfect peace and perfect 
joy. Blessed, then, is that Book that reveals 
to me that I am a son of God ! And how 
blessed and how delightful is this conviction 
when we are placed in circumstances of tribu- 
lation, of affliction, and bereavement ! There is 
scarcely a family on earth that knows not what 
bereavement is : you have lost father, or mother, 
or son, or daughter, or relative — I will not say 
" lost," for that is a heathen word ; a dead 
Christian is not lost, — he is only lost in the 
same sense as the star at mid- day — we cannot 
see him. 

" The dead are like the stars by day, 
Removed from mortal eye, — 
Yet not extinct : they hold their way 
In glory through the sky." 

Yv r hat a blessed thought is this, then, when 
our parents and children are removed from us ! 
Those that are gone and those that are left, ii 
they are the sons of God, are not really much 



191 

separated ; they are all living in the same home 
of our Father : the departed occupy a higher 
. story ; we that remain, a lower one. We are 
in the gloomy crypt; they are in the grand 
cathedral that is above, where all is light, and 
joy, and harmony, and peace. That dead 
father, that dead child that fell asleep in Jesus 
— they are in the same house with us; they 
only occupy an upper floor, while we occupy a 
lower one ; and we are waiting till the Voice 
that made their hearts still and their souls 
happy shall also speak to us, and say, " Come 
up hither;" and we shall obey the summons, 
and on angel wings soar to a brighter and a 
better home. What a consolation is it. then, 
to know that we are the sons of God ! and what 
an effort should we make to see that all about 
us and connected with us are the sons of God 
also ! And how blessed is the thought that our 
Judge is our Father in the season of trials and 
afflictions ! If I look at God in the light of my 
sufferings, I must think of him as the heathens 
ihought — as a wrathful God; but if I look at 
my sufferings in the light of " Our Father," 
then I feel my sufferings are as beneficent angels. 
Never forget this precious truth. Ta..e care 



that you never look at God in the light of your 
afflictions, but that you look at your afflictions 
in the light of God your Father. Make your 
footing firm in the Fatherhood of God, ana 
from that footing look at everything that be- 
falls you. If you do so, whatever affliction you 
meet with will be seen as a Father's chastise- 
ment, befitting a beloved son. God is no ab- 
straction, as some men think, but he is a Father ; 
He is not a monopoly of mine — " My Father," 
but he is " Our Father ;" He is not a Father 
that may change and forsake us, but he is eter- 
nally our Father. 

Having noticed the adoption which is private, 
I will briefly speak of the public adoption that 
will be hereafter, which is called the redemption 
of the body. This is properly an Easter thought ; 
yet it is a thought for every Sabbath. Every 
Sabbath is an Easter Sunday. For it was on 
the first day of the week that Christ rose, and 
the Lord's day is observed on that account. 

The soul of the Christian, when he dies, 
enters into heaven ; the body rests in the tomb, 
in hope again to rise. It is as true that that 
body in which your soul now lives is redeemed, 
as it is that your soul, that will be re-united to 



THE CHRISTIAN'S AGONY AND HOPE. 193 

it, is redeemed. Christ's blood redeemed the 
house and the inhabitant for ever. We wait for 
the redemption — that is, the recovery, the com- 
plete restoration of the body — this body and not 
another. I do not believe that the resurrection 
means a different body; many persons have a 
vague notion that it is so. If it were so, it 
would not be a resurrection. Resurgo means, 
"I rise again." If it were another body, it 
would be a second creation. It is the same 
body, purified, refined, exalted. We do not 
know what enormous susceptibilities of beauty 
may be deposited in these frail bodies of ours ; 
we know not but that, when the repressive 
power of sin shall be removed, the body that 
is now so full of aches, and is day by day ap- 
proaching the dust, shall unfurl wings we knew 
not of, and develop powers of which we had no 
conception, and be a glorious and illuminated 
shrine for the glorious and happy soul to dwell 
in for ever and ever. I believe it will be so ; 
and therefore we wait — we long for the redemp- 
tion of the body. 

Who has not heard of beautiful analogies 
used to prove the resurrection ? I have myself 
employed them, but not to prove the fact, for 

o 



194 

they do no such thing ; at most they can only 
obviate difficulties and objections. You will hear 
persons say : " We have no doubt of the resur- 
rection, because the chrysalis develops itself 
into the butterfly, the acorn into the oak, the 
seed into the beautiful flower ; and the earth, 
when she lays aside her winding-sheet of snow, 
puts on in spring and in summer her green rai- 
ment and coronal of flowers." We admit these 
are all symbols, and only symbols, of the resur- 
rection ; they are beautiful analogies that obviate 
difficulties, but they do not prove the resurrec- 
tion. If they proved it, why did not Socrates 
learn the great fact of the resurrection? Yet 
the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater 
than Socrates. If these proved the resurrec- 
tion, why did not the women at the sepulchre, 
or the disciples of Jesus, instantly recollect it ? 
Remember where Jesus was laid — he was laid 
in a garden, and when was he laid there? 
Amid the rich dawn of an Asiatic or Eastern 
spring, when the earth starts into magnificence 
and beauty, as it were at one sudden blush — 
in such a spring, and in the midst of a garden, 
Jesus was laid when he was taken from the 
Cross. But if these analogies prove the resur- 



THE CHRISTIAN'S AGONY AND HOPE. 195 

rection now, why did not the Apostles hear the 
flowers, and the spring, and the garden, say, 
" Fear not, He will rise again ?" They heard no 
such summons — they had no such hope. " This 
is the third day/' they said, "and he is not 
risen." And when he did rise, they could 
scarcely believe for joy that it was Christ who 
had risen from the dead. These analogies may 
obviate difficulties, but they do not prove the 
fact of a resurrection • we have far better proof 
than these for the resurrection of the body. 
One single fact is better than all analogies ; 
and that single fact is, that Jesus opened the 
grave, " the first-fruits of them that slept." If 
I am called to go and speak to some mother 
who has just lost her only son — her stay, her 
staff, and her strength, and if I wish to comfort 
her with the belief that her son shall rise again 
and meet her at the last day, when she is under- 
going that grief which weeps bitterly, or that 
still more bitter grief which cannot weep, what 
shall I say ? — if I talk to that afflicted mother, 
of butterflies and beautiful flowers, and spring 
and winter, and all the other analogies, in order 
to prove the resurrection, she will feel them but 
cold, cold comfort to her withered and bleeding 

o2 



196 the christian's agony and hope. 

heart ; but if I talk to her of the widow of 
Nam, — if I take her to the sisters of Bethany, 
■ — if I appeal to the tomb of Joseph in which 
Jesus lay, — if I let her hear sounding from the 
skies the voice that was so musical on the earth, 
" I am the resurrection and the life : he that 
believe th in me, though he were dead, yet shall 
he live." " The day is coming when they that 
are in their graves shall hear the voice of the 
Son of man, and come forth ■" then she has 
comfort — she can understand a fact. The poor- 
est person in our grey moors can keep a fact in 
his memory, and feel its influence on his heart ; 
but he cannot discuss analogies. "When we 
ourselves arc sinking to our rest on a dying bed, 
we can easily grasp a fact, while we cannot 
entertain and analyze illustrations and analogies. 
Dr. Arnold, that great scholar, and, with ail 
his errors, that great Christian, says, " Nothing 
afforded us so much comfort, when shrinking 
from the outward accompaniments of death — 
the grave, the clothes, the loneliness — as the 
thought that these had been around our Lord 
and Master, around the body of him that died 
and is alive for evermore/'' 

It is thus that we anticipate, on the clearest 



THE CHRISTIAN'S AGONY AND HOPE. 197 

evidence, this blessed fact, that we shall rise 
again. Then, let us bear patiently with the 
calamities around us, and seek to alleviate them 
by such hopes j let us pray for an increase of 
the first-fruits of the Spirit — greater increase 
than we have yet attained; and wait in patience 
for the resurection, that is to say, the redemp- 
tion of the body. How should we long for it if 
we knew and felt what it is ! No disease, nor 
tears, nor death, nor hostile elements are there; 
no shadow, no biting, piercing cold, nor scorch- 
ing suns ; but perfect physical beauty, perfect 
moral repose. I am one of those who believe, 
that this earth will be a part of the abode of the 
happy for ever. Why should it not ? I do not 
like the idea of consigning to the devil this 
globe, in which there is so much that is beauti- 
ful, though there be very much marred and 
sinful. "Why should it be consigned to him? 
There is nothing inseparably sinful in stcne; 
there is nothing necessarily wicked in trees; 
there is nothing horrible in bright flowers, in 
beautiful stars, and in all that is around us. 
The Bible does not say earth will not be de- 
livered. I believe it will ; and that just as our 
souls shall be rescued from the bodies that now 



cover them, and in -which they groan, and shall 
be introduced into bodies, elevated, purified, 
sublimed, ennobled, so this creation, now groan- 
ing and travailing, shall be emancipated from 
its present diseased, marred, and cursed frame- 
works, put on its new vestments, assume its 
real grandeur, and be a bright and blessed nook 
of that bright and blessed world in which there 
shall be happiness and joy for ever and ever. 

Reader, is this your hope ? Have you any 
sympathy with these things? A day comes 
when all that is in the world will look pale 
indeed. Your wealth, your talents, your wis- 
dom, your power, however beautiful, and proper, 
and useful now, are but the shadows ; the sub- 
stance is in the future. Then, I ask you, Are 
you Christians ? I ask you so, because I wish 
you to be happy now ; I wish every Sunday to 
be to you an Easter Sunday ; I wish every day 
you spend to be gilded and gladdened by a 
sense of righteousness; I wish to see all ele- 
vated to the highest Christianity — they will 
then be elevated to the highest happiness. Are 
you partakers of the Spirit? Are you born 
again ? — not baptised only, but regenerated 
by the Spirit of God renewing your hearts ? 



THE CHRISTIANAS AGONY AND HOPE. 199 

Are you resting on the blood of Jesus ? Do 
you love the Bible ? Do you love to hear what 
will make you holier, and happier, and better ? 
And do you long, amid the travail of the week, 
for the rest of the Sabbath, as a forelight of 
that future rest that remaineth for the people of 
God — a fore-token, too, of the coming deliver- 
ance of earth from its bondage, and humanity 
from its sins and sorrows ? 



CHAPTER VII. 

PRESENT SUFFERING AND FUTURE GLORY. 

" The path of sorrow, and that path alone, 
Leads to the land where sorrow is unknown.'* 

" For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are 
not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be 
revealed in us." — Rom. viii. 18. 

I have endeavoured to render more andible 
and clear that welcome voice, " There remaineth 
a rest for the people of God." I have endea- 
voured shortly to describe some of the charac- 
teristic features of that rest. I now consider 
tc the glory to be revealed" as not the least com- 
prehensive character of the rest that remaineth 
for the people of God. To these words, not 
omitting the previous suffering, I will especially 
direct your attention. 

We have, first, the present state of the people 
of God, — " sufferings" — " the sufferings of this 



PRESENT SUFFERING AND FUTURE GLORY. 2C 1 

present life ;" and we have next, the future 
happiness of the people of God, — " the glory 
that is to be revealed." Human nature, like 
the sons of Zebedee, would like to enjoy the 
last ; but it would wish to be absolved from the 
first. This cannot be. The law of the present 
dispensation is, " In the world ye shall have 
tribulation." The law of the future dispensa- 
tion is, " a rest for the people of God." The 
world's doom is, "Woe unto you that laugh 
now, for ye shall weep." The Christian's 
destiny is, ." Blessed are ye that weep now, for 
ye shall be comforted." Paul had experience 
of both stages : he had tasted of the sufferings 
of this present life ; and he had seen what few 
besides have — " the glory that is to be revealed." 
It is after his realisation of both that he says, 
not merely as an inspired writer, but as one 
who had made the experiment, and was com- 
petent to pronounce a verdict — " I reckon," he 
says — I make the calculation — " that the suffer- 
ings of this present life are not worthy to be 
compared with the glory that is to be revealed 
in us." 

It may, indeed, be asked, in what respect 
Paul had any special experience of the suffer- 



202 PRESENT SUFFERING 

ings of life. Every possessor of the present life 
is apt to say, in the midst of his sufferings — 
1 ' Ah ! my sufferings have no parallel ; my trials 
have never been equalled : they are peculiar, 
poignant, singularly and exclusively so." Can 
any sufferings that we are called upon to bear, 
or that Ave have borne, be, for one moment, 
compared with the sufferings of him whose 
history is depicted, not by himself only, but by 
the pen of those who witnessed his trials ? He 
had sufferings of all sorts. He tells us he was 
in cold, in hunger, in nakedness, in fastings, 
beaten with stripes, in prison, in perils of all 
kinds. He endured and suffered these things 
in all places, for he was in peril by sea and on 
land, in the city, in the desert, in the country. 
And he received his afflictions from all sorts of 
persons — Jews and Gentiles, open foes and 
professing friends. His sufferings, as delineated 
by himself, and recorded by those who witnessed 
them, seem to have been sufferings almost un- 
paralleled in multitude and intensity. It is 
abundantly plain, that it was no person who 
had been educated on a soft lawn, but on a 
battle-field, that makes the calculation here ; 
no one who had been clothed from his youth in 



AND FUTURE GLORY. 203 

fine apparel, and brought np in kings' palaces, 
who institutes the contrast, but one who had 
drunk the cup of sorrow to the dregs, who had 
endured an amount of persecutions of no ordi- 
nary intensity, as minutely related by himself 
and by those who were eye-witnesses, both 
inspired by the Holy Spirit of God. 

He had privileges, also, such as few besides 
had. He had the earnest of that " glory that 
is to be revealed/' in his heart, which every 
Christian tastes, " Christ in you the hope of 
glory." So far he shared with every believer; 
for the man who has not a foretaste of heaven, 
will never, in all probability, have the full taste 
of it ; the man who has not heaven, in some 
measure in him now, has no reason to expect 
that he will be in heaven hereafter. Heaven 
begins in the individual heart, and grows in 
intensity and joy till the individual heart is 
merged in the glory to come. But the Apostle, 
in addition to this^, earnest of heaven, records 
that he was taken up into the third heaven; 
that he was received into Paradise, and that he 
there witnessed scenes so splendid that human 
tongue faltered when it attempted to delineate 
them ; that he breathed an air, beheld a sun- 



204 PRESENT SUFFERING 

shine, and was baptised into a glory so effulgent, 
so overwhelming, that it was impossibla for 
him, the eloquent, the gifted Paul, to give ex- 
pression to what he heard and saw. He had 
travelled from Jerusalem to Rome, a sufferer ; he 
had travelled from earth to heaven, witnessing 
glory rising upon glory, till at last his great 
mind was too small to comprehend it, and his 
eloquent tongue unable to express it. If any 
man, then, was able to make the calculation 
with mathematical precision, and from personal 
experience, it was he who so suffered, and was 
so favoured. 

He says : " I reckon that the sufferings of 
this present world are not worthy to be com- 
pared with the glory that is to be revealed in 
us." And this sentiment, on which I am 
founding my remarks, is not an isolated one : 
the Apostle embodies the same sentiment in 
perhaps yet stronger language when he says, in 
his 2nd Epistle to the Corinthians : " Our light 
affliction, which is but for a moment." How 
remarkable the contrasting words — " Our light 
affliction \" Words uttered by him that was in 
peril by land, in peril by sea, scourged, beaten, 
stoned, imprisoned, cast to the wild beasts; 



AND FUTURE GLORY. 205 

suffering from false brethren, false professors ; 
who had been grieved and vexed beyond all 
description : besides the recollection of his own 
past life ; — he says : " Our light affliction, which 
is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more 
exceeding and eternal weight of glory.'''' Let 
us study the force of the contrast : light afflic- 
tion — a iveight of glory : light affliction for a 
moment — an eternal weight of glory." And that 
" light affliction, which is but for a moment," 
is not sent to punish us, but to work out in us 
and for us " an eternal weight of glory." How 
significant and instructive are these words ! 

Very expressive is the name which is here 
given to that rest that remains for us, and which 
I have endeavoured to delineate, the "glory 
that is to be revealed." At present, as I shall 
show, we have but a few scattered beams of it 
falling into the darkened chambers of our 
minds; but afterwards the veil shall be lifted 
away ; the dark curtain shall be drawn aside ; 
and in that " rest that remaineth for the people 
of God," there shall be revealed to us a glory 
that will make us wonder we did not oftener 
wish to be there, and wonder more that we 
were at the trouble of complaining of a thorn 



206 PRESENT SUFFERING 

in the foot when boundless acres of boundless 
grandeur were so soon to be our happy walk. 

But let us inquire how, and in what respects, 
this glory shall be revealed. Glory, in the 
Bible, means the revelation of something splen- 
didly great ; its means intenser light cast upon 
an excellent object, so that that object shall be 
more clearly seen. For instance, when the 
Bible speaks of giving God glory, it means 
making God known. An infinitely excellent 
being needs but to be known, to be seen to be 
glorious ; and the more clearly he is known, 
the more glorious he seems. Man is so im- 
perfect that he needs to hide himself to seem 
great ; hence, the nearer a man is to you, the 
less great he seems, and the more you know 
him, even the best and most gifted, the less 
impressive he will appear. But the more that 
you know of God and of things eternal, the 
more glorious, the more attractive they will 
appear, and the more they will raise your con- 
ceptions of the grandeur of him who is en- 
throned upon the very riches of the universe, 
and is all- glorious. 

The glory that is to be revealed will be a 
glory revealed from creation ; it will be a glory 



AND FUTURE GLORY. 207 

revealed in Providence, in our retrospect of 
Providence ; and it will be a glory revealed in 
Redemption. There will be successive stages 
of it, as the late excellent and devoted Mr. 
Bickersteth said, whose loss, whose great loss, 
at this moment so large a section of the church 
deplores — a loss which it is supposed was partly 
occasioned by the painful conflict in his mind 
respecting the issues of that controversy which, 
I thank God, has been decided as he would 
have wished, and so far in favour of Evangelical 
religion — a decision which shows that the great 
danger in the present day is from the priest and 
not from the state. His mind was so harassed 
by anxiety in this matter, that it is said to have 
been one means of precipitating that which all 
so unfeignedly and so deeply deplore. What 
joy would it have been to that noble-minded, 
catholic man, if he had heard the decision which 
has been given ! He knows the falsity of the 
contrary view now, because he is in that glory 
" the successive stages " of which (to use his 
own language) he endeavoured to delineate, the 
full enjoyment of which he so ardently hoped 
for. 

Though I cannot take all Mr. Bickersteth's 



208 PRESENT SUFFERING 

stages, I may refer to two or three : the glory 
that -will be seen in creation; the glory that 
we shall see in a retrospect of Providence ; and 
the glory that shall be revealed in looking at 
Redemption. 

Creation, I need not add, is now blotted, 
marred, injured. The mirror which once re- 
flected God's glory is darkened ; and we cannot 
see it as it was seen, still less as it one day will 
be seen. Men speak of creation being quite 
sufficient for them, without revelation. There 
cannot be a greater misapprehension, for what 
does creation show ? Much of God's goodness, 
I admit; but it shows also much of his anger 
or his judgment. I gaze at the lark rising 
upon its untiring wing, and singing in the sun- 
shine so musically and so joyfully, and I say, 
" How good must be the God that made that 
merry bird \" But I watch five minutes longer, 
and a hawk comes down upon it with the speed 
of the lightning, tears it to pieces, and feeds 
upon its warm blood ; and then I must say, to 
be consistent, " How offended must that God 
be so to make his creatures I" The inference I 
am compelled to draw is, I know not whether 
he is the good God that the rising and joyful 



AND FUTURE GLORY. 209 

lark seems to indicate, or the offended God that 
this violent assault upon that symbol of joy- 
seems now to betoken. Thus, creation gives 
conflicting views of what God is ; and I cannot 
have confidence or rest in it as it now is. But 
when the glory shall be revealed on it, then all 
nature shall be changed, all creation repaired, 
renovated, and restored. We shall see the foot- 
prints of God everywhere, the handiwork of God 
in everything. We shall see his smile in the 
sunbeam, his beauty in the rainbow, his great- 
ness in the expanse of the firmament strewn 
with stars, his goodness in the texture of all, 
and his presence and his power upholding all. 
The cloud that now covers creation shall be 
withdrawn; the glass through which Ave now 
see so darkly shall be broken ; and whatever 
the microscope now discovers in the depths, and 
whatever the telescope discovers in the heights, 
shall be brought within the horizon of those 
whose privilege it is to be in the glory that 
shall be revealed. All sounds then shall be 
harmony, and all sights shall be beauty; the 
very universe itself shall be a grand and a glo • 
rious hymn, and stars and flowers the words in 
which it is written; a perpetual morn shall 

p 



210 PRESENT SUFFERING 

shine upon all things, and no mist or exhala- 
tion shall darken it for ever — the universe will 
he a grand temple. There is no temple there, 
for God is its temple; its floor, the emerald; 
its dome, the sapphire ; its altar, the son of 
God. All things were very good once ; all 
things shall be very good again. " Instead of 
the thorn shall come np the fir-tree, and instead 
of the brier shall come up the myr tie- tree •" 
and nature shall be a portrait of all that God 
is — as beautiful, complete, and expressive, as 
any portion of the Bible itself. 

But this glory that is to be revealed, will also 
be revealed in Providence. I have no doubt 
that part of the occupation of saints in happi- 
ness, will be that of taking a retrospect of all 
the way that God led them. At present our 
whole life is an inexplicable web ; it is tangled, 
confused, apparently conflicting, always inex- 
plicable in its deepest movements, indicating 
only the issue; but when we shall take a retro- 
spect of all the way that God has led us, from 
some lofty pinnacle or eminence in the better 
land, how changed will things appear then from 
what they are now ! What we now call great 
and splendid will then be seen to have been but 



AND FUTURE GLORY. 211 

an exquisitely gilded toy ; what the world 
thinks now so mean will then appear clothed in 
its great magnificence. Many a grand cathedral 
that the world admires now, will then be seen 
to have been but a mausoleum of the dead; and 
many a little church and humble chapel that the 
world despises now, will then be seen to have 
been a birthplace of the living, and a nursery 
of saints for God. Spots that are now the 
shrines of the grandest recollections — days that 
are now anniversaries of great events, seen from 
"the glory to be revealed," will lose all their 
beauty : and obscure dwellings, and by- streets, 
and hidden lanes, where saints have been born, 
where the cross has been meekly endured, where 
the battle of life has been heroically fought, and 
where the victory has been gained, though un- 
proclaimed, will ever be radiant spots through- 
out the ages of eternity, nor lose their interest 
even in that resplendent glory that is to be 
revealed. That persecution which we once so 
lamented, will then be seen to have chased 
many a soul to heaven, to have illustrated the 
principles for which the martyrs suffered, and 
to have made them spread the wider and grow 
more popular. That sickness, so severe, so pro- 

p2 



212 PRESENT SUFFERING 

tracted, which we thought to be an essential 
calamity, and concerning which we often prayed, 
— "Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass 
from me/' — that sickness of which we could 
not understand the why, the wherefore, the 
beginning, or the end ; the object of which we 
could not explain, will then be revealed to have 
been as necessary to our salvation as that Christ 
should have died upon the cross for us. It will 
be found not to have been chance, but the 
mission of God; not to have been penal — or 
a judge punishing a culprit — but paternal, a 
Father chastening a son. At that day, too, 
that bitter bereavement, that severe loss that 
darkened the home that was bright — the very 
recollection of which lies like an avalanche upon 
the heart, that breaks under the sense of it — 
will then be seen to have been meant to be 
one tie less to knit us to this world, and one 
tie additional to attract us to that better world. 
We shall find, what we even see now, that there 
was mercy in gradually loosening the tree that 
it might fall gently and beautifully ere it was 
transplanted to a balmier clime, that thus it 
might be spared the necessity of being torn up 
by the roots violently and by force. 



AND FUTURE GLORY. 213 

In this glory that is to be revealed, too, we 
shall discover that those we thought to be lost, 
were not lost, but had only the privilege of 
earlier reaching home, and of preceding us to 
the glory that is to be revealed. The babe on 
whose beautiful brow you gazed, and whose loss 
you grieved over — the friend with whom you 
took sweet counsel and walked to the house of 
God — the revered and venerable parent whose 
loss you lamented and grieved over upon earth, 
you will then wonder that you were so left to 
yourselves as to lament for a moment; for if 
lamentation were needed, it was for those that 
were left, not for those who were gone. They 
will then appear in redemption-robes — glorious 
groups — a blessed vision, standing on the 
shores of that everlasting sea, with palms in 
their hands, and singing the triumphant song 
of Moses and the Lamb. What an illuminated 
expanse will the past be ! — all the ways along 
which Providence led us — luminous in the glory 
that is to be revealed ! Heroes, philosophers, 
statesmen, poets, tradesmen, merchants, sena- 
tors, we shall there discover, were all busy doing 
their own work, promoting their own designs; 
but really, without one single exception, intended 



214 PRESENT SUFFERING 

or unintended, they were doing the will of God. 
God in history will be the subject of our retro- 
spect in the past : we shall see him in its rills, 
its rivulets, its torrents, its cataracts, super- 
intending the least, and controlling the greatest. 
There will be in that retrospect no chapter 
without God — no episode visible in which there 
is not God. We shall see that what we called 
chances, changes, accidents, vicissitudes, were 
all under the touch, and responding to the will 
of God, from the fall of a sparrow to the depo- 
sition of a monarch ; from the chirp of the 
grasshopper to the shout of a nation. We shall 
see that God was in all, bringing good out of 
evil, glory to himself, and happiness to them 
that were his — that there are no such things as 
fortuitous accidents and that there never were, 
but that each event had its mission, each cen- 
tury its duty; and the very bitterest stream 
that poured into our cup, or the strongest one 
that carried away like a torrent those we loved 
or the property we valued, we shall discover, to 
our delight and surprise, to have been indeed as 
bitter, as devastating, whilst it rushed by, as we 
felt it, but yet to have come direct from the 
fountain of mercy and goodness — the bosom of 



AND FUTURE GLORY. 215 

our Father and our God. It is thus, then, that, 
in that glory to be revealed, creation will appear 
so expressive, Providence so harmonious, and 
we shall only wonder that we ever saw it without 
God, or ever looked at it in any other light. 

But this glory will be revealed more promi- 
nently in the Gospel of Christ. This is the 
third and grandest stage of all. When we look 
into the Book of Revelation we find that the 
Lamb is in the midst of the hundred and forty 
and four thousand; that "a Lamb, as it had 
been slain," is the object of the adoration of 
heaven. I think it is one of the most striking 
proofs of the inexhaustible grandeur of the 
Atonement, that heaven's highest glory is never 
without it. Christ slain is the vision of heaven 
— the burden of the songs of the redeemed, 
" To him that washed us from our sins in his 
OAvn blood." And if Christ occupy such a place 
in heaven — such a place in the hearts of its 
tenantry — wherever and whatever that heaven 
may be — ought he not to occupy a greater and 
more glorious place in the hearts of us sinners ? 
In that glory that is to be revealed, we shall 
see what greatness, goodness, love, mercy, truth, 
have been manifested and harmonised in that 



216 PRESENT SUFFERING 

great fact, the incarnation and the sacrifice of 
Jesus. 

We shall then apprehend more fully the love 
of God. How often, and how carelessly, do we 
repeat those grand words — words that have no 
parallel in the language of man : " God so 
loved the world that he gave his only-begotten 
Son, that whosoever believeth in him should 
not perish, but have everlasting life ! " "Weigh 
this truth; it will bear to be analysed, — to be 
dwelt upon, — to be minutely examined; it 
ought to be cherished in the heart ; it ought to 
be the deepest and the dearest truth that 
humanity retains. "" God so loved the world 
that he gave" — not merely permitted — "his 
only son." Nothing less than an infinite sacri- 
fice would express His love; nothing less than 
an infinite sufferer could be the channel for its 
egress; nothing less than the death and sacrifice 
of Jesus, the only-begotten Son of God, could 
either recover us, or express God's great love to 
us. W r e shall then see the height, and depth, 
and length, and breadth of the love of God, 
which now we so dimly and inadequately com- 
prehend. We shall see that that love is so 
great that it has placed us, not only beyond 



AND FUTURE GLORY. 217 

the penalties of law, but in the sunshine of 
adoption itself; that it has not only introduced 
us to a Legislator acquitting us, but to a Father 
welcoming and cordially embracing us. And I 
am sure, if there be shame in heaven, the shame 
and confusion of face will be that we read words 
descriptive of God's love, and of the Saviour's 
sufferings, enough to electrify the whole uni- 
verse, and that they passed through our hearts 
so often, scarcely leaving an impression or an 
echo behind them. If this be true, that God so 
loved us — if it be true that God in our nature 
died for us, then I do say that the response we 
give to it in our deepest fervour is most inade- 
quate, yea, criminal, and unjust. 

But not only shall we see in that glory to be 
revealed, God's great love, but we shall see, 
too, all his attributes harmonised in the re- 
covery of the sinner, clearly as we have never 
seen them before. Power, and goodness, and 
truth, and wisdom, are manifest in creation, and 
we shall see that it is so ; they are manifest in 
Providence, and we shall see it to be so; but 
they are eminently, singularly, gloriously mani- 
fest in the atonement of Christ Jesus; sin pun- 
ished, yet the sinner saved ; the law magnified, 



218 PRESENT SUFFERING 

and yet the breaker of that law admitted into 
heaven; God just, and yet justifying the sinner 
who believes in Jesus ; God true to his threat- 
ening — " The soul that sinneth, it shall die" — 
and yet the soul that sins admitted into heaven! 
What a cluster of wonders ! And how glorious 
will all these facts and phenomena be when 
they lie, not in the cold and misty light of this 
world's unbelief, but in the clear and warm 
light of that glory that is to be revealed ! 

Then, too, shall we see the results of this 
cross in a way in which we never saw them 
before. The least of them is death itself de- 
stroyed. Death we shrink from, instinctively 
and naturally : for, we were never made to die. 
God made us to live ; man made himself to 
die. But, through the grace of him who did 
not make man to die, and in spite of the sin of 
him who made himself to die, that death which 
we dread is even now seen to be altogether 
altered ; it has become now a reclaimed servant. 
Christ has taken Death into his service, and has 
deprived him of his sting, his venom, and his 
wrath : and he is now the friend and the mis- 
sionary of the Lord of glory. He is merely a 
gatherer of flowers for Paradise : — 



AND FUTURE GLORY. 219 

* Who gazes at the flower with tearful eyes, 
Who kisses their drooping leaves, 
"lis for the Lord of Paradise, 
He binds them in his sheaves. 

" Oh ! not in cruelty, not in wrath, 
The reaper came that day — 
'Twas an angel visited the earth 
And took the flowers away." 

More than this, Jesus has abolished death. 
A Christian does not die ; the continuity of a 
Christian's life is not even suspended by death. 
To a Christian, death is merely undressing — 
it is his laying aside the garments of mortality, 
and entering into the presence-chamber, there 
to wait till that garment of immortality shall, 
by the resurrection trump, rising in more than 
its Eden beauty, be restored to the inhabitant 
that waits for it ; that soul and body may ever 
be in the glory that is to be revealed. And 
when that glory is revealed, graves which have 
scarred the earth shall be extinguished; Satan 
shall be bound with chains, and cast into the 
outer depths of the universe, a sufferer for 
ever ; and the end of creation, the end of 
Providence, the end of redemption, will be 
glory to God in the highest ; on earth, in all 
its animal, intellectual^ moral, spiritual, and 
physical economy, peace and good-will^ to the 



220 PRESENT SUFFERING 

highest and intensest degree/ seen to ha\ ; 
been expressed to all mankind. How blessr-d 
then will all things be when this glory shall be 
revealed ! The earth, that has groaned anc 1 
travailed so long in pain, shall then come to 
the birth. What is " nature," or Natura (from 
nascor) about to bring forth. " Nature groans 
and travails in pain, soon to give birth to a 
new heaven and new earth, waiting for what ? 
"The manifestation of the sons of God." A 
baptismal flood of fire, we are told, shall purify 
it; a new and nobler genesis shall pass upon 
it ; Christ's own benediction, when he comes 
forth from the Holy place, where the High 
Priest now is, shall be pronounced; and that 
benediction shall go down to nature's depths, 
and rise to nature's heights; and the earth 
shall yield her increase, for God, our God, shall 
bless us, and all the ends of the earth shall 
praise him. Nature will then lay aside her 
ashen garments, and put on her Easter robes, 
and there shall be no more tears, nor weeping, 
nor sorrow, but an everlasting Sabbath, a 
ceaseless jubilee; and the 21st and 22nd chap- 
ters of Revelation, which are now in print, 
shall then be actual, and in fact. There shall 



AND FUTURE GLORY. 221 

oe no more night, and the nations of them that 
are saved shall walk in the light of it ; the 
gates shall not be shut; they shall see His 
face; there shall be no need of candles, nor 
light of the sun, for the Lord God Almighty 
giveth them light, and they shall reign for ever 
and for ever. 

Such is a faint, twilight ray of the glory that 
is to be revealed. But why do I describe this 
future ? Because man lives instinctively in the 
future. There is no one who is not living in 
the future, expecting from to-morrow that 
which he fails to draw from to-day. There is 
no one who does not feel that his happiness is 
yet to be. Each admits it is not yet, but each 
hopes it is to be. If men will only let their 
hopes stretch beyond the horizon which bounds 
this world, into that brighter world where the 
glory is to be revealed, then their hopes and 
expectations will be found just and true and 
precious. But the reason why I try to delineate 
this future rest — this glory to be revealed, is, 
because, when the higher light comes into one's 
mind, it will extinguish the lower; when the 
higher preference takes possession of the heart 
it will dislodge the lower preference ; and. just 



222 PRESENT SUFFERING 

in proportion as the rays from the future glory 
dawn npon ns will the little twinkling tapers 
and glow-worms of present glory fade and dis- 
appear. I might, in order to lead men to 
accept the gospel, speak to them of the arch- 
angel's trump, and of the coming judgment, 
when the notes of that trump shall be as 
the reverberations of an earthquake shaking 
sea and land. I might picture to the reader 
each risen lost one, crowding, with pale face, 
and throbbing heart, to the judgment- seat, 
so immersed in the shadow of his approaching 
doom, as to be unable to hear the crash or 
witness the spectacle of a dissolving world. I 
might figure the Judge upon the great white 
throne ; I might repeat the last dread sentence, 
" Depart from me, ye cursed." But it seems 
to me that these are God's " strange things," 
and that his grand design is to wdn by love, 
rather than drive by terror ; to draw from the 
lesser to a lovlier beauty; to lead us from being 
satisfied with the cistern, to seek after the foun- 
tain; to draw from the things that perish in 
the using, to that glory which is to be revealed 
in us, and which endures for ever and ever. 
Very true it is, I can describe it but imper- 



AND FUTURE GLORY. 223 

fectly ; and yet one feels satisfaction in this — 
for one's own imperfection is here so far satis- 
factory — that it is impossible to exaggerate the 
glory that is to be revealed. I may come short, 
and must come short ; but exaggerate, poet, 
painter, or preacher, never can. " Now we see," 
says the apostle, " through a glass darkly." We 
have but a faint apprehension of it ; and I am 
certain, from the glimpses that are occasionally 
given, that if we had a clearer apprehension of 
it, we should say with the Psalmist oftener, 
who said it from a throne-top : " Oh that I had 
wings like a dove ! for then would I fly away, 
and be at rest." 

But, after all, we know very little of this 
world. How, then, can we expect to know 
much of that future w T orld ? There is scarcely 
a fact with which you come into contact that 
is not more or less an inexplicable mystery to 
us. How is it, for instance, that the rose-tree 
growing up the walls of our house, covered 
w T ith its fragrant and its beautiful flowers, no 
sooner hears the autumn wind begin to chant 
its vesper song, than it drops its leaves — parts 
with its beautiful flowers — gathers in all its 
vital forces — somewhat like a gallant ship 



224 PRESENT SUFFERING 

preparing for a storm, by taking in canvas, — 
and thus seems to make ready for the coming 
winter ? The very bird, — the irrational bird 
-—in that rose-tree seems to hear its warning 
too ; for it takes its flight to a sunnier clime 
and a milder air. How do we explain this ? 
Why is it that even dumb nature — the material 
and animal creation — thus knows things that 
man himself but imperfectly comprehends ? 
In leaf and feather, moss and fern, are wrapt 
up mysteries that man cannot unravel. If, 
then, we have but so faint glimpses of mys- 
teries in the world about us, we can have, at 
best, but a dim glimpse of the future that is to 
be revealed. 

I have thus looked at the glory which is the 
coming destiny of the people of God : let me 
now very briefly allude to the present sufferings 
which the Apostle says are not worthy to be 
compared with it. In what respects are present 
sufferings not worthy to be compared witn the 
glory that is to be revealed ? 

In the first place, the sufferings of a Chris- 
tian never can touch the highest point of his 
nature. A Christian never can know what it 
is to have corrosion of mind, — agony of co&» 



AND FUTURE GLORY. 225 

science, — remorse. All the pain or suffering a 
Christian man can feel, — bereavement, loss, 
sickness, or disease, — must be outer. But the 
glory that is to be revealed, the happiness that 
awaits us, fills the inner and highest portion of 
the man. The soul is the recipient ; and there- 
fore sufferings which do not reach the soul are 
not worthy to be compared with the happiness 
which shall penetrate and overflow the soul, and 
constitute the highest joy in the highest portion 
of man's nature. 

In the second place, our present sufferings, 
whatever they be, are not always. Our life is 
light and shadow, cloud and sunshine; tears in 
the evening, while joy cometh in the morning. 
But, in that better life, the joy with which our 
present sufferings are contrasted, is permanent, 
unsuspeuded, and without end. The river flows 
for ever, the tree grows for ever, and the glory 
shines for ever; and therefore sufferings that 
are only occasional, are not worthy to be com- 
pared with a glory that will be perpetual. 

In the next place, in our severest sufferings 
in this life there are compensatory elements. 
God " stays his rough wind in the day of his 
east wind." In sickness cf body we have 

Q 



226 PRESENT SUFFERING 

sanctification of heart; in pain of the outer 
man we have great peace in the inner man; 
if we lose a child or a relative, we feel he is 
not lost — he is only gone before. Thus, our 
sufferings in this life, even when greatest, have 
interwoven with their texture, and intermingled 
with their current, and ever bubbling up from 
its depth, constant compensatory joys ; but, in 
the life to come, our joy will have nothing to 
interfere with it : it will be undiluted, un- 
mingled ecstasy, perpetual happiness, unclouded 
joy. Hence, sufferings which are intermingled 
with compensatory and neutralising elements, 
are not worthy to be compared with joy in 
which there shall be no intrusive sorrow — 
which shall be perfect and everlasting. 

Our present sufferings, even when worst, 
never exceed the strength of our powers of 
endurance. Beyond a certain pitch, suffering 
ends in death or in insensibility; but, in the 
world that is to come, our capacities shall be 
infinitely enlarged, our susceptibilities of bliss 
made infinitely sensitive, and the joy that we 
shall experience shall rise to the measure of 
the great capacities that God will give us. 
Therefore, in this life, our sufferings, which do 



AND FUTURE GLORY. 227 

not fill our present capacity of suffering, are not 
•worthy to be compared with a joy which shall 
fill our enlarged capacities of joy and pleasure 
in the life to come. 

And, lastly, our present sufferings are but 
temporary ; but the glory to be revealed is 
eternal. The finite cannot be compared with 
the infinite ; the temporary is not worthy to be 
counted with the eternal ; and well, therefore, 
did the Apostle conclude, for reasons that lie 
deep in the nature of the suffering, and clear 
and luminous upon the face of the glory, " I 
reckon that the sufferings of this present life 
are not worthy to be compared with the glory 
that is to be revealed in us. " Thus, my dear 
reader, the rough and stormy voyage will soon 
be over to the youngest, and the haven of per- 
petual rest will open its bright bosom to us all : 
the flinty road will soon be traversed ; and the 
happy home, whose majestic glory wears a 
home-like aspect, because of the near and the 
dear ones that have peopled it before us, will 
soon encompass us. Let us live in the future ; 
draw from it compensatory elements; enjoy a 
foretaste of the glory before it comes. There 
will be a vast multitude there. " I beheld," 

q2 



228 PRESENT SUFFERING 

says the seer, in that beautiful Revelation, 
te and, lo, a great multitude, which no man 
could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and 
people, and tongues, stood before the throne, 
and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes, 
and palms in their hands." " These are they 
which came out of great tribulation, and have 
washed their robes, and made them white in 
the blood of the Lamb. Therefore are they 
before the throne of God, and serve him day 
and night in his temple ; and he that sitteth 
on the throne shall dwell among them. They 
shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more ; 
neither shall the sun light on them, nor any 
heat. For the Lamb which is in the midst of 
the throne shall feed them, and shall lead them 
unto living fountains of water : and God shall 
wipe away all tears from their eyes." Once 
they were afflicted, as some of us may be, — now 
they are happy ; once in goat-skins and sheep- 
skins, — now in a state of purity, for they are 
white ; once they were struggling in conflict, — 
now they are victorious in battle. 

To sum up all I have said, in the words of 
Robert Hall : " How should we rejoice in the 
prospect, certainty rather, of spending a blissful 



AND FUTURE GLORY. 229 

eternity with those whom we loved on earth ; 
of seeing them emerge from the ruins of the 
tomb, and the deeper ruins of the fall, not only 
uninjured, but refined and perfected, with every 
tear wiped from their eyes, standing before the 
throne of God and the Lamb, in white robes, 
with palms in their hands, crying with a loud 
voice, ' Salvation to our God, and to the Lamb, 
for ever V What delight will it afford to renew 
the sweet counsel we have taken together, to 
recount the toils of the combat, the labour of 
the way, and to approach, not the house, but 
the throne of God, in company, in order to join 
in the symphonies of heavenly voices, and lose 
ourselves amidst the fruition of the beatific 
vision ! To that state all the pious on earth 
are tending. Heaven is taking to itself what- 
ever is congenial to its nature, is enriching 
itself with the spoils of the earth, collecting 
within its capacious bosom whatever is pure, 
permanent, divine, leaving nothing for the last 
fire to consume but the objects and the slaves 
of concupiscence ; while everything which grace 
has prepared and beautified shall be selected 
from the ruins of the world, to adorn that eter- 
nal city which hath no need of the sun nor of 



230 PRESENT SUFFERING 

the moon to shine in it, for the glory of God 
doth lighten it, and the Lamb is the light 
thereof." 

In closing my remarks upon this passage, 
let me ask the reader to remember, that the 
glory that is to be revealed is for those who 
have the characteristics of the eighth chapter 
of the Epistle to the Romans. Are we, then, 
in Christ ? Do we walk after the spirit, and 
not after the flesh ? Are we spiritually minded ? 
Is Christ in us ? for, " If any man have not the 
Spirit of Christ, he is none of his." Are we 
led by the Spirit? Do we say, "Abba, Father?" 
Do we suffer with Christ ? for then only shall 
we reign with Christ. Are we, in one word, 
Christians ? I do not mean, to ask you, reader, 
Are you baptized? I have no doubt of that. 
I do not mean, Do you come to the Lord's 
table? I do not inquire, Do you observe the 
Sabbath ? But are you something more than 
all this ? Is your heart changed ? Are your 
treasure and your heart where Christ is ? If 
Christianity had never been, would you have 
just been the same ? Suppose, dear reader, you 
had never seen the Bible — or heard the Gospel, 
would you have been as you now are ? If so, 



AND FUTURE GLORY. 231 

the Gospel has done nothing for you ; you have 
not received any advantage ; you have incurred 
a load of heavy responsibility, which you will 
have to discharge in the sight of Him to whom 
all hearts are open, and from whom no secrets 
are hid. If this Gospel has not given a new 
tone to your character, a new elevation to your 
hopes, a new refinement to your taste — new 
sympathies, and new motives, it has failed, or 
rather you are not benefited. To be a Christian 
is not to subscribe a creed, or to chant a prayer, 
or to sing a hymn, or to come to the Lord's 
table ; it is to be changed in heart and nature ; 
so that in all places, in all companies, in all 
employments, in all disputes, in all debates, in 
all undertakings, the glory of Christ, — the safety 
of souls, — the highest present and eternal hap- 
piness of man, shall be your chief aim, and 
God's word shall be your conclusive directory. 
Hearing a sermon is of no more merit than 
kissing a cross, or kneeling at an altar, or shar- 
ing in a splendid ceremony. Our work begins 
when the address of the preacher closes. It is 
-neant that what we hear in the sanctuary, we 
lould take home to our hearts and consciences. 



23.2 PRESENT SUFFERING 

and either reject or accept it. It is the bitterest 
mockery to come instantly to the house of God, 
to hear faithful sermons, join in evangelical 
prayers, and afterwards go home with no real 
or permanent influence on the heart, no change 
of course, of character, of conduct, of views, of 
thoughts, of affection, of love. To come to the 
house of God is not so much duty as precious 
privilege. To hear the sermon is not the end of 
our coming to the house of God; it is to receive 
instruction, impulse, motive, hope, so real, that 
all will help to make the week-day toils more 
holy, and the week-day heart more happy. Let 
no one say, "We are so busy in the world 
that we cannot take up seriously the affairs of 
our souls." Want of time, in this matter, 
never can be an excuse. God has placed us 
here for one grand purpose, — to ripen for eter- 
nity. If in travelling to a distant spot we 
spend the whole day in gathering flowers, till 
night come upon us when we can no longer 
travail, the guilt is entirely our own. To be 
rich is not necessary, to be great is not neces- 
sary, to be celebrated is not necessary ; but to 
be Christian is necessary. All else can be 



AND FUTURE GLORY. 233 

dispensed with, except an answer to this ques- 
tion : " What mnst I do to be saved ? " And 
until that question is settled, and settled in the 
very depths of our hearts, and in the light of 
God's countenance, all our religion is but a 
m ckery, a delusion, and a snare. I ask you, 
reader, Arc you a Christian ? Are you in heart 
and conscience, a child of God? Are you living 
as such, sacrificing as such, counting your pre- 
sent sufferings, if you suffer, not worthy to be 
compared with the glory that shall be revealed? 
If you are resting on the Crucified for accept- 
ance, looking to the Glorified for happiness, then 
the eyes that now see through a glass dimly, 
shall soon see face to face; those hands that 
hold tremblingly the cup of sorrow, will soon 
wave the palm; those heads that are bowed 
down beneath a burden of care shall be en- 
circled with everlasting garlands ; and those 
sad voices that have often been heard in the 
night in agony : " Wretched man that I am ! 
who shall deliver me from this body of death ?" 
will yet be heard again, saying : " Unto him 
that loved us, and washed us from our sins in 
his own blood, and hath made us kings and 



234 PRESENT SUFFERING AND FUTURE GLORY, 

priests unto God and his Father, to him be 
glory and dominion for ever." 

u Art is long and time is fleeting, 
And our hearts, though stout and brave, 
Still, like muffled drums, are beating 
Funeral marches to the grave. 
Let us, then, be up and doing, 
With a heart for any fate, — 
Still achieving, still pursuing, 
Learn to labour and to wait." 



CHAPTER VIII. 

REMAINING DUTIES. 

" O'er life's humblest duties throwing 
Light the earthling never knew, 
Freshening all its dark waste places, 
As with Hermon's dew." 

"But this I say, brethren, the time is short ; it remaineth, 
that both they that have wives be as though they had 
none ; and they that weep, as though they wept not ; 
and they that rejoice, as though they rejoiced not ; and 
they that buy, as though they possessed not ; and they 
that use this world, as not abusing it : for the fashion of 
this world passeth away." — 1 Cor. vii. 29 — 31. 

In this chapter, by the grace and aid of the 
Spirit of God, without which I must write, and 
the reader study, without any profit, I would 
discourse of that enlightened and Christian 
view which we are here authorised and enjoined 
to take of the world, especially the slightness of 
that hold which the cares, the honours, the 
wealth, the sorrows, and the losses of the world 
ought to have on every Christian's heart. 



236 REMAINING DUTIES. 

The Apos e was dealing with those who had 
proposed some intricate, circumstantial, and 
ceremonial questions ; and to these he substan- 
tially says : — " These questions have their im- 
portance. I do not dispute their relative value 
— matters of discipline, and form, and ceremony 
have some importance ; but if you will only see 
aright the shortness of time, the instancy of 
judgment, and the responsibilities crowded into 
the brief hour that sweeps past with almost 
lightning speed, you will learn to care less 
about matters of ecclesiastical arrangement, and 
to be more anxious about the safety of the soul, 
the honour of God, the nearing prospects of 
eternity. In short (says the Apostle) the time 
is too short for discussing, still less disputing 
such matters : ' it remaineth, that both they 
that have wives be as though they had none ; 
and they that weep, as though they wept not ; 
and they that rejoice, as though they rejoiced 
not ; and they that buy, as though they pos- 
sessed not/ " Now, I believe that one great 
reason why the cares, the wealth, the honour, 
the losses of this present world seem to us so 
weighty and important is, that we look at them 
in the light of this world only. If we look at 



REMAINING DUTIES. 23? 

the stars at night what a splendid Apocalypse 
is that sky in which so many bright sentinels 
seem to wait and watch about the throne of 
Deity ! but if we gaze upon the same sky by 
day, when the sun himself has risen, we shall 
find that by his splendour he has put out all 
the stars. If we look at this world's honours, 
wealth, disputes, in the light of this world, like 
the stars at night, they are alone prominent, 
brilliant, and attractive ; but if we only lift the 
curtain that keeps off eternity, and let even 
some stray and straggling beams of that eternal 
light upon this world's cares, wealth, honour, 
losses, anxieties, they will all be shrivelled into 
little space, and look pale and dim in the 
greater splendour of eternal and endless day. 
It is so, and in the same degree, with the pains 
and losses as well as the gains of time ; — of the 
former we shall be taught to say, if we see them 
in the light of eternity : — " Our light affliction, 
which is but for a season, worketh for us a far 
more exceeding, even an eternal weight of 
glory." 

That time is short is one of the most com- 
mon and popular aphorisms of every day. 
E/ery man admits it; and every man exclaims, 



238 REMAINING DUTIES. 

as we meet him in the intercourse of society, 
" How time runs away." The only strange 
anomaly, and this not a rare one, is that class 
of people that are always trying to kill time, 
as if it did not die of itself fast enough. They 
cannot get it off their hands ; they call them- 
selves at their own disposal, and they speak of 
their time being at their own disposal ; but 
really they seem to me to be at the disposal of 
time, and of every stray and accidental occur- 
rence that drifts towards them in the world and 
carries them with it. That time is short every- 
body feels, but nobody as he ought. This is 
evidence of the state in which we all are. It is 
not a new truth that we need, but a deeper im- 
pression of the old one. Hence one of the great 
functions of the pulpit is not so much to pro- 
vide new truths, as to try and put the old ones 
at that angle and in that light, that they shall 
be felt to strike and leave impressions per- 
manent as life, and precious as the rewards of 
eternity itself. Christianity in the head is the 
condition of almost every one now. Christianity 
in the heart is the rare possession of the peo- 
ple of God. Christianity in the outer porch 
is one thing, and in its place a good thing; 



REMAINING 1H T TI£S, 239 

but it is Christianity in the heart — even the 
holy chancel — the sacred place within — that is 
salvation to him that knows it, and proof of 
the true influence that that Christianity was 
meant to exert. "The time, then," says the 
Apostle, " is short." Every swing of the pen- 
dulum is the signal for a soul's passage to the 
judgment-seat of God. What a solemn fact is 
it, that when the mortality is at its ordinary 
rate, about six persons die every hour in this 
great metropolis ! We meet in the sanctuary 
each Sunday at eleven, and before we retire 
nearly twelve persons in the metropolis will have 
passed to the judgment-seat. What a plea for 
prayer, that they that live may live in the Lord, 
and they that die, die in the Lord ! The time 
of life, I repeat, is short, — very short , and, by 
a strange experience, that all are perfectly con- 
scious of the nearer we approach the close of 
life, if we live to its utmost limit, the more 
rapidly life runs on. Have we not often 
noticed that a year at twenty seems exceedingly 
long ? at the age of thirty one year is equal to 
about ten months ; at forty a year is equal to 
about eight months; at fifty to about seven 
months ; about sixty it comes down to about 



240 REMAINING DUTIES. 

five months. People remark every day, " How 
fast the Christmases come round ! How rapidly 
the years rush away \" The golden visions of 
youth soon become dim; the broad space and 
the bright prospects become narrower; and 
every old man sees the horizon shutting down 
around him, till the diameter of that horizon 
seems only the length and breadth of that grave 
that he must soon occupy. True, poets may 
gild the experience of humanity with beauty, 
but the fact itself teaches us searching and 
solemn lessons. One of the most beautiful and 
classic poets in our language has tried thus to 
explain the fact, that years seem shorter as we 
grow older. In exquisite poetry, and as true as 
it is poetic, he says : — 

" The more we live more brief appear 

Our life's succeeding stages ; 

A day to childhood stems a year, 

And years like passing ages. 

" When joys have lost their bloom and breath, 

And life itself is vapid, 

[which last is not a Scriptural remark] 

Why, as we reach the falls of death, 

Feel we its tide more rapid ? 
" Heaven gives our years a fading strength, 

Indemnifying fieetness, 
And gives to youth a seeming length 

Px'oportiou'd to their sweetness." 



REMAINING DUTIES. 241 

Whatever be the value of some, of the 
thoughts in this beautiful explanation, it admits 
the great fact we all feel, that life is short if it 
reach its utmost limits, and that the sands run 
faster the nearer they are run out. The time of 
life, then, I say is short. If it were true that 
all reach seventy, eighty, or ninety years of age, 
it would be short even then ; but the few, not 
the many, reach so protracted a period. "What 
home has not evidences of this ? What parent 
has not facts in his domestic experience that 
attest the precariousness of the dearest life? 
What burial-ground has not graves a few inches 
as well as a few feet long ? What, and how 
frequent, evidences have we not that babes — 
those sparkles, as it were, of life, which this 
cold world would utterly extinguish — are often 
caught by that beneficent Father who sent them, 
and transferred to that more ethereal air in 
which they shall glow with seraph's fire, and 
shine with inexhaustible splendour for ever and 
ever ? It seems to me as if God, in taking the 
infant from the mother's bosom, intends to 
teach her not only that life is short, but to give 
that mother a stake and an interest in, and a 
sympathy with, a better and a brighter world, 

R 



242 REMAINING DUTIES. 

to which her babe has preceded her, a happy 
and a welcome emigrant. In the case of fami- 
lies in which there are many losses, it seems as 
if God were simply changing the home. In- 
stead of lifting the whole nest, as it were, from 
the tree where it now is, into that tree of life 
where it will be, he empties it one by one, and 
by thus transplanting them he colonises heaven ; 
and leads the lessening number no more to 
cleave to the earth, as if this earth were home, 
but increasingly to long for wings like a dove, 
to flee away, and reach that better home where 
the others have preceded. Thus, Death, when 
he comes into the circle of the family, and 
carries away those flowers that the poet said 
were no sooner blown than blasted, but which 
the Christian feels are only transferred to 
bloom in a better country, — when death comes 
and gathers, and plants in his bosom those 
spring- flowers, the babes that we love, he 
seems to me to lose half his terrors, and to 
look beautiful, because he carries in his bosom 
those that are dear to us. At least we feel 
less afraid and less shrinking to go through 
the valley of the shadow of death, because that 
valley, long as it is, is yet fragrant with the 



REMAINING DUTIES. 243 

perfume of those that have preceded us. In- 
fants' graves are the footprints of angels; and 
I feel no hesitation in saying so, because I am 
one of those who believe that, while half the 
human family dies in infancy, ail children 
dying in infancy are saved, not because bap- 
tised, but because chosen in Christ before the 
foundation of the world. When a babe is 
dying, and its friends tell me, "Our babe is 
dying, — come and baptise it," I do so, and 
think it very right of them to make the request. 
But yet I cannot forget, that baptism is de- 
signed for the Church militant, not for the 
Church triumphant. That dying babe has the 
inner baptism of fitness for heaven, and it has 
no need of an outer baptism, or introduction 
into the outer Church, which it shall not live to 
see, however beautiful and proper it may be to 
baptise it. Baptism is for the Church militant, 
and on the supposition that the baptised person 
is to live; but if evidently dying, the child 
needs not our baptism. It is thus that we see 
mercy in the loss of the young ; those images 
that are deposited in the memory of parents as 
in picture galleries, from which they can never 
be effaced on earth, are testimonies — living and 

u2 



244 REMAINING J)UTIES. 

eloquent testimonies — that while life is short, 
if it last till the longest, it is often shorter still. 
The infant dies, the boy dies, the youth dies; 
even in the marriage ceremony itself death is 
spoken of : in every lease that you draw, death 
is always supposed possible. All things remind 
us of the uncertainty of life, and everything 
shows that time is short. 

But there is another section of our experience 
that will prove that time is short, and that is 
the time of privilege. We forget that, if the 
young may soon die, and the aged must ulti- 
mately die, that there is a short parenthesis in 
every man's life during which God speaks to 
his conscience. If that period be missed or 
passed by unimproved, God will withdraw and 
say — " My Spirit will not strive with him any 
more." We have no right to specify that 
period in any man's case, or to say, " This is 
the ultimate possibility of your salvation •" but 
we know a thousand things may fix that limit ; 
health is precarious, and it may fail; we may 
be able to hear the church-going bell no more ; 
lunacy may supervene and end our day. One 
single drop of fluid touching that delicate 
machinery which men call the brain, can 



REMAINING DUTIES. 245 

paralyse every limb, and induce mania of the 
most hopeless kind. If there be no responsi- 
bility where there is lunacy, yet there may have 
been incurred grievous responsibility, — oppor- 
tunities lost — mercies despised — long before 
madness came on. Besides, if we hear the 
gospel, and still fail to improve what we hear, 
there may be no further opportunities offered 
by the Holy Spirit of God. We can scarcely 
expect that we shall be suffered long, to hear 
messages that ought almost to quicken the dead 
and to electrify the living, day after day, and 
Sabbath after Sabbath, while we turn away — ■• 
one man to his farm and another to his mer- 
chandise, and another to his home — careless, 
unimpressed, and unconcerned. We cannot 
expect that God will suffer such ungrateful 
returns, or that his forbearance and patience 
will last so long. The present moment is the 
intensest point of human existence ; the hour 
that passes is the pivot on which eternity may 
revolve. What men are in time, that they are 
in eternity : generally as men live, so they die : 
and as men die, so they exist in happiness or in 
misery for ever and ever. Thus, time is short. 
That shortness, I may just notice, though I 



246 REMAINING DUTIES. 

were to shut the Bible here, would be to me 
irresistible evidence that this is not the last 
stage of man's existence. If man is meant to 
be extinguished the moment that he closes his 
eyes upon this world, a cruel Being must have 
made him ; for that Being has implanted in his 
heart, yearnings, instincts, and longings which 
balk him, and make him more miserable, and 
inexplicably so, as far as we see. The very 
shortness of man's life is to me the evidence 
that we are marching to a future life — that we 
are speeding on to eternity — and that in a few 
short years we shall stand at the judgment-seat. 
And what an array of human countenances will 
be there ! — some radiant with hope, others blank 
with despair, gazing into that unsounded future, 
in which, in happiness or in woe, they must live 
for ever. If this be true — if the dead must 
rise, if the soul shall live wretched or happy, if 
the trumpet shall sound, if the bronze, the 
marble, and the green sod shall equally move 
aside, and pour up their living tenantry — if ail 
shall stand at the judgment-seat of Christ, to 
live or die for ever, according to what they have 
been here, the time is short enough to make 
ready ; it remains that " they that weep, weep 



REMAINING DUTIES. 247 

as though they wept not ; and they that rejoice, 
as though they rejoiced not. 

Let us now look at the practical results, or 
remaining duties. The time is short, and the 
first result should be, that " they that have 
wives should be as though they had none." 
" I have married a wife," was the excuse of 
one for not coming to the great festival that 
represented the gospel ; and we are told again, 
that " he that loveth father or mother, sister 
or brother, wife or children, more than me, is 
not worthy of me." What seems to me very 
naturally implied in these words is, first, that 
marriage is honourable in all, priest and people; 
but the duty that devolves upon all is, that 
they who marry should be as though they had 
marrisd not. The minister of the gospel must 
not say, " I cannot do this or that, because I 
have a wife and children ; " the tradesman must 
not salve over the dishonesty of which he is 
consciously guilty, by saying, te I have a wife 
and family to provide for." The memento to 
such a one is, that time is short ; " they that 
have wives should be as though they had none." 
But apart from this we shall find our safety and 
our success in business are far more allied to 



248 REMAINING DUTIES. 

an honest and conscientious discharge of every 
duty in the sight of God than at first sight may 
appear. But if it were not so, the wife ought 
to be an auxiliary, not an obstruction, in our 
course to glory. If she be otherwise, we must 
say, "what will it profit a man to gain the 
whole world, and lose his own soul ? " It will 
be no excuse at the judgment- seat, for our losing 
our souls, that we had each a wife that would 
not go with us to church, or a husband that 
would not join us at the communion-table. It 
will be no excuse at that tribunal before the 
Almighty, "I was obliged to be dishonest, to 
be untrue, because I had a wife and family to 
provide for/' I sympathise with the claims of 
the family : but we are by energy, honesty, 
industry, and the blessing of God resting upon 
us — which will not be withheld if we seek it 
— to provide for them; we may not make 
them an excuse for that which conscience 
condemns and God's Word discountenances. 
But the prescription, " They which have wives 
be as though they had none," should not make 
your home more gloomy, or your care for your 
home less true, or your sympathy with your 
home less deep; the very contrary. There 



REMAINING DUTIES. 249 

is no countenance of asceticism in the gospel 
of Jesus ; it purines human joys and sanctifies 
human sorrows. Jesus beautified and made 
happy by his presence the bridal festival before 
he sympathised with them that wept the loss of 
the near and the dear. The first miracle Jesus 
performed was at a marriage-feast. He height- 
ened, by that blessed example, domestic joy 
before he went out to alleviate human sorrow ; 
he rejoiced with them that did rejoice in Cana 
of Galilee, before he went to weep with them 
that did weep — with the sisters of Bethany over 
the grave of their beloved Lazaras. The sins 
of men were heavy upon him ; the road before 
him was rough ; the cross was at its end ; and 
yet that blessed Saviour turned aside in his 
arduous and painful journey in order to make 
more happy a happy pair; that Christianity 
might be seen dawning, like the morning light 
from the mountain -tops, in the quiet joys of a 
nuptial blessing; and consecrating the purest 
joy of humanity, it went to sympathise with 
deep suffering, or to bind up the sorrows of the 
broken-hearted. To pour new sunshine on earth, 
as well as to open up the glory that is to be 
revealed, is the aim of the gospel. It is happy 



250 REMAINING DUTIES. 

news, as well as holy news. The Bible is a fit 
gift at bridals as at burials. The epicurean 
would say, " Time is short, therefore eat, drink, 
and be merry; for to-morrow we die." The 
ascetic would say, " We die ; therefore run 
from the world's duties and responsibilities : 
get on the top of a pillar, like Simon Stock, or 
go into a nunnery, and abandon the world 
altogether." Time is short, says the Gospel; 
therefore do not say, u I will not marry." Do 
not marry, and make your home your temple, 
and your wife the object of worship ; but let 
them u that have wives be as though they had 
none ; and they that weep, as though they wept 
not ; and they that rejoice, as though they 
rejoiced not." 

Let us next consider other phases of life 
where Christ is equally precious. The next 
is: — "And they that weep, as though they wept 
not." It is natural to feel; it is human to 
weep — it is Christian also; and in this world 
countless are the springs of human sorrow and 
tears. The stoic would say, " You must not 
weep; for this is the pefection of humanity." 
The Saviour says we may weep; nay, the Saviour 
himself wept. I think one of the most eloquent 



BEMAINING DUTIES. 251 

texts in the Bible is, " Jesus wept." If some 
one near, dear, and beloved has been borne aAvay 
from this world to yonder better world, it is not 
impossible to forbear to weep ? If you are 
called in to comfort some such weeper, say not, 
in the first instance, "Do not weep;" this is 
the language of stoicism or of ignorance of 
human nature. There is a period in human 
sorrow when the soul needs to be relieved, 
when grief needs an echo or response, not re- 
pression. It is, inhuman at such a moment 
to snow down commonplace maxims, such as 
"Do not weep." Jesus wept, — humanity must 
weep ; but the regulating principle, the proper 
course, is, to weep as though we wept not, 
feeling that there are deeper sorrows, urgent 
duties, instantly opening to us and devolving 
upon us. If, then, some dear one has been 
taken away — if the gem that shone so beauti- 
fully by your fireside, and in the rays and 
sparkles of which you rejoiced so long, lias 
been removed out of sight, and you weep at 
the recollection, be as though you wept not, 
when you know that what was a bright gem at 
your fireside is now fixed, a brighter star in 
the celestial firmament for ever. If you weep 



252 REMAINING DUTIES. 

in such a case, another angel, or the same angel 
that appeared to Mary, Trill appear to you at 
the grave of your beloved dead, and "will say, 
" Weep not ; he is not here : he is risen." 
Beautiful it is, I cannot but remark, that God 
is making heaven less a strange land to us, and 
casting over its majestic glories, by the numbers 
of our relatives he takes there, every day, a 
more home-like aspect; so that when we follow, 
and are admitted within its precincts, we shall 
find friends, and brethren, and children, and 
fathers, and mothers — all the constituents of 
faded fire- sides; and it will be only exchanging 
a cold, bleak, and precarious home for a bright 
and joyous, even an unchangeable one. And if 
we only felt more than we do the blessedness of 
that home that will be, and compared it more 
than we do with the trials of this home that 
now is, we should exclaim, as another poet — if 
you will suffer me to quote one more — has 
said : — 

u How happy 
The holy spirits who wander there, 
'.Mid flowers that never shall fade or fall ! 
Though mine were the gardens of earth and sea. 
Though the stars themselves had flowers for me, 
One blossom of Heaven out-blooms them all ! 



KEMAINING DUTIES. 253 

Go ! wing thy flight from star to star, 
from world to luminous world, as far 
As the universe spreads its flaming- wall ; 
Take all the pleasures of all the spheres, 
And multiply each through endless years, 
One minute of Heaven is worth them all ! " 

Then let us weep as though we wept not. 

But we are also called upon here to rejoice 
as though we rejoiced not. If it be human to 
weep, it is no less so to rejoice ; if it be natural 
to weep, it is natural also to rejoice. There is 
no more piety in a gloomy face than in a bright 
one; indeed, if there be any difference, less in 
the former, for wherever Christianity makes the 
heart dilate with its inspiration, the brow will 
be brightened and smoothed by its influence. 
But when we rejoice, we are to rejoice, as our 
Lord tells us, as though we rejoiced not. There 
is much in this world that ought to cause joy. 
Joy is to be gathered from literature, from 
poetry, from music, from painting, from home 
with its quiet scenes, from the literary world, 
from national prosperity and social progress ; 
these are all springs — proper and legitimate 
springs of joy. Still the joys that come from 
these are earth-born ; we are only to sip them 
as with the palm of the hand while we pass 



254 REMAINING DUTIES 

along — \re must not tarry to drink deeply of 
them. We are travellers through a wilderness ; 
we may gather the occasional flower that 
blooms upon the path, we may enjoy its fra- 
grance, we may taste of the spring which the 
oasis discloses in order to refresh us ; but we 
are not to sit down — we must hasten onward — 
looking for a "city that hath foundations/' 
and for u a better country." What is so beau- 
tiful as the sky that closes on the earth, and 
folds it in its embrace ? What so fitted to give 
joy as the first bud of spring, or to compose to 
solemn thought as the last rose of summer? 
What more delightful to a sensitive ear than 
the beautiful melodies, the harmonies, and the 
varied combinations of music ? What a scene 
— what a birthplace of joys is the fireside ! In 
these things we may rejoice legitimately, truly 
rejoice. These are ministering angels still; — 
their ministry is not superseded or arrested by 
our acceptance of the gospel. But we must 
still recollect that all these are evanescent — 
that they are lent only for a moment — that 
there is not a heart now bounding with joy that 
will not one day be beating rapidly with fear — 
that there is not one who reads these pages., 



REMAINING DUTIES. 255 

whatever his wealth, his joys, his hopes, who 
must not lay his head down, and it may be very 
humbly, upon the last pillow, and gather him- 
self up, and yield up the ghost. The joys of 
this world are to be tasted in their place — but 
only sparingly. They must be the refreshments 
of life, but not its food ; they may be the beau- 
tiful and adorning fringe, but they must not be 
the woof and warp of the robe of life. There is 
something higher, better. We must set our 
affections not upon things that are below, how- 
ever joyful or beautiful, but upon things that 
are above; rejoicing in them as though we 
rejoiced not. 

We must also "buy as though we bought 
not, and possess as though we possessed not." 
Christianity in these words admits the distinc- 
tion of property. Communism is as unchristian 
as it is absurd. "The poor ye have always 
with you." The rich are addressed in the New 
Testament as a class distinct from the poor; 
there is the same gospel for both ; and duties 
clear and unequivocal devolving on both ; and, 
by a law that God nas wrought into the very 
texture of things, 11 the poor neglect their 
duties to the ricn, tne poor are the first to 



256 REMAINING DUTIES. 

suffer ; if the rich neglect their duties to the 
poor, they are the first to suffer. No man. 
winds a chain about the hand of his fellow tiiat 
is not compelled by a necessary law, in Goa J s 
holy providence, to wind the other end about 
his own hand. No man pronounces a curse 
upon his fellow which does not come back to 
Hinself in its echo. You cannot harm your 
neighbour without harming yourself; you can- 
not connive at your neighbour's low, suffering, 
sai itary condition, without finding in your own 
experience that it will tell upon your own 
health, however rich, great, or apparently re- 
mote you may be. The Apostle says, " Let 
those that buy be as though they bought not." 
Trade, then, is Christian; the distinction of pro- 
perty is Christian ; but property has its duties 
as well as rights. More than this — trade is 
holy : the exchange is placed beside the temple ; 
traffic, as it were, is thus consecrated ; and you 
may, therefore, be a tradesman or merchant 
and yet be a Christian. You are to be a mer- 
chant, but a Christian merchant — that is to say > 
profit and loss are not to be the exclusive or 
absorbing thoughts or anxieties of your soul. 
You are not to trade in order to make a fortune 



REMAINING DUTIES. 257 

to leave behind you, 01% as some foolishly do — • 
to enjoy themselves, as they say, when they 
retire and get old : than this there is no greater 
practical blunder; for if you actually live till 
the age of eighty, and if up to sixty you have 
spent your time in the hardest drudgery, in 
order to amass the fortune you now possess, 
you cannot now enjoy it. You have forgotten 
that though your means of enjoyment have in- 
creased, by the physical law of your nature, as 
you advance in years, your capacity of enjoy- 
ment decreases. Those fruits that were so 
sweet when you were young, and of which you 
then thought you could never have enough, 
and for an accumulation of which you have 
toiled, and drudged, and laboured, do not taste 
the same when you become old — not because 
those fruits have changed their nature, but be- 
cause you have grown old, and your sensibilities 
are deadened. Their flavour and beauty are the 
same — your sensibilities are altered. Therefore, 
to lay up money in order to enjoy it when you 
are old is a blunder, in the experience of man; 
and, in the sight of God, a grievous sin. " La- 
bour not, then, for the meat that perisheth, but 
for that which endureth unto everlasting life/* 



258 REMAINING DUTIES. 

Trade, as you traded not ; buy, as though you 
bought not ; and sell, as though you sold not. 
Do these things as duties ; take these as refresh- 
ments by the way ; they are lawful and Chris- 
tian-like. In them you may glorify God • but 
you destroy and vitiate all when you make 
them objects of worship, or the pursuit of them 
the staple of life. 

Ie Use the world," adds the Apostle, " as not 
abusing it." Thus the Apostle says, we may 
have the world's honours, the world's wealth, 
the world's smile ; but then we are not to abuse 
it, but to use it. We may not debase and 
prostitute our position to carnal and sensual 
purposes. We are to use our property, in 
active beneficence, but not to abuse it, by laying 
it up to rust ; we are set apart to show man- 
kind that we can use our wealth for diffusive 
good, instead of hoarding it for contingencies 
that may never occur, or reserving it for persons 
whose use of it may injure, not bless, themselves 
and society : let us employ it as a help to a 
better world, in Christianising, humanising, 
making happier, all mankind. To abuse it is 
either to hoard it or to try to have a monopoly 
of it, or to lay it up for purposes that may 



REMAINING DUTIES. 259 

never come, or which may be altogether useless 
or mischievous. Use it, and it cannot rust; 
abuse it, and it will be a corroding and destroy- 
ing curse. A weighty reason for all this is the 
fact, that " the fashion of this world passeth 
away." The word used by St. Paul, and in our 
version translated " fashion," is borrowed from 
the ancient theatre. The performances were 
conducted in the open air, and by daylight ; 
there was no roof to the theatre; the actors 
wore masks, representing the characters which 
they personated. Now, the Apostle says, this 
world has its fashions, shape, and peculiar struc- 
ture, or scheme ; and the masks are various. 
One wears the mask of a king, another that of 
a noble, another that of a peasant, another that 
of a mechanic ; but underneath all the masks 
there lies the great common human nature. 
The Apostle represents all rank and degree, as 
it were, as a pure conventionalism, not as an 
absolute, genuine, standing, permanent fact. 
He describes these as the imagery of a masque- 
rade. All appear different to what they are. 
By and by, death marches on the stage, takes 
off each man's mask, shows that the human, 
sanctified or unsanctified, remains ; and leaving 

s2 



260 REMAINING DUTIES. 

the masks on the floor, he sweeps all that wore 
them off the stage to the judgment-seat of God, 
where each man mnst answer for the part he 
has played, and how he has played it. Use the 
world, therefore, " for the fashion of this world 
passeth away " If I take the allusion in its 
broader sense, Are not all things passing away ? 
Let any aged man ask himself at this moment, 
" Where are my early playmates ? where the 
friends of my youth, and the companions of my 
manhood?" — let any man who has even reached 
the period of middle life take a retrosjjcct, and 
see how many that have had as great promise 
of long years and happy years as he had, are 
now mingled with the dust. Do not new faces 
meet you at every corner ? Are not new voices 
heard every Sunday in every psalm that is sung? 
Does not life become more and more a bundle 
of broken fibres, one of which drops every day ? 
Is not our existence becoming more and more 
fragmental ? Does it not seem as if, year after 
year, this world were becoming more a foreign 
land — that in the midst of the stranger we may 
long for our Father's house, where our friends 
and our brethren are? Ties are lessening, 
flowers are fading, and every day the sky shuts 



REMAINING DUTIES. 261 

down over fewer of those we love ; and all 
things tell us that time is short. It remains 
therefore that those who weep, should be "as 
though they wept not ; and they that rejoice, 
as though they rejoiced not ; and they that 
buy, as though they possessed not, and they 
that use the world, as not abusing it : for the 
fashion of this world passeth away." 

Time is far shorter, in every period and 
moment, than we imagine. Do I address the 
young? Your time is short — very short — far 
shorter than you suppose. Youth is a most 
precious season in the experience of man ; let 
it pass, and it is a period that can never be 
enjoyed again. I do not say that if youth pass 
unsanctiiied, you will not have further oppor- 
tunities of knowing God ; but I do say that this 
is the time when the seed may be most easily 
sown, for the heart is now most susceptible; 
now the seed sown may be longest retained; for 
the heart of youth is most retentive. Let it pass, 
and it is passing with the rapidity of a rapid 
stream falling down between two mountains — 
like a day between two nights, and you will 
have no such opportunity again for receiving a 
new heart, or being impressed with real religion . 



262 REMAINING DUTIES. 

I am perhaps addressing in these pages some 
reader who is now under a deep and solemn 
impression that time is very short. Such a 
period does occur in every man's experience, 
when the glare of the world becomes dim — and 
the roar of the wheels of the world is for a 
moment silenced — and when, you know not 
why, a sort of sad, pensive feeling comes over 
you ; this is a ripple, as it were, of the tides of 
the great ocean of eternity • it rushes through 
your heart, to make you pause, and ponder, 
and think. Let that solemn, sequestered, silent 
moment pass without laying hold upon God in 
prayer — and it has passed probably for ever. 
There is a time, too, when you lose your pro- 
perty — a moment that is short, but a moment 
when precious impressions may be made. It is 
then that you feel how precarious is your tenure 
of all things ; you then grope and look about to 
find some rock, braving the restless wave, stand- 
ing upon which you can feel secure. This is 
the time for prayer and vital communion with 
God ; but it is short : let it pass, and it is lost 
for ever. The time of painful bereavement is 
very short, but it is a time for great and quick- 
ening impressions. When you have lost some 



REMAINING DUTIES. 263 

near and dear one, does not your -wealth, if you 
are rich, appear to you utterly worthless ? and 
if great and celebrated among men, does not all 
seem to you truly contemptible amid your deep 
sense of loss? That grief absorbs all. That great 
sea-billow, to use the words of the Psalmist, 
sweeps over you; and everything else is lost 
sight of but the loss of the near, the dear, and 
beloved one. Such is a moment unspeakbly 
precious — then the soil is prepared for the 
living seed. It is short; for the impression 
wears off : let it pass without spiritual improve- 
ment, and it is gone for ever. 

When this time — so short as seventy or 
eighty years even when longest — is shortened 
by half the human family dying in infancy, and 
still further shortened by a large section of it 
dying in youth and manhood, and is now clos- 
ing, it is, surely, reasonable to ask, What is to 
be the end of it ? We are all going to meet 
God. Of this there is no doubt. It is just as 
true as that you look upon this page at this 
moment that you shall look upon the counte- 
nance of God, in the light of which the most 
secret sin shall be seen, and that sin appear as 
the gigantic mountain — that countenance to 



264 REMAINING DUTIES. 

which the blaze of the stars — the splendour of 
the lightning — the burning sun, are but the 
dimmest sparkles ; you and I, dear reader, must 
gaze on that countenance, and there read our 
doom, and see whether God be our unrecon- 
ciled Judge, or our acquitting and welcoming 
Father in heaven. 

When the time that now is has passed unim- 
proved and unsanctined, the result is certain. 
It is endless sorrow. If there were not endless 
penalties among the lost, it would not have 
been worth while for God to send his Son to 
die for us. So vast an interposition would not 
be justified by anything short of the rescue of 
man from irretrievable perdition. This short 
time, then, will end in tremendous issues — 
eternal joy or eternal misery. All analogies 
and experience preach this fact. If the farmer 
neglects his seed-time he reaps no harvest ; if 
the sailor neglects the tide, he loses twelve 
hours of a voyage, or may lose it altogether; 
if the youth neglects study, he grows up igno- 
rant. And, as sure as you are living, my 
reader, by the same great law and analogy 
that God has commanded to run through crea- 
tion, providence, and grace, if you do not now 



REMAINING DUTIES. 265 

secure a footing on the Rock of ages, and lay 
hold of the atoning power of that precious 
blood by faith, and plead for its application 
to your consciences, so surely you wiU perish 
everlastingly. The short time will have van- 
ished ; and — terrible thought ! — there will be 
no retracing your steps. If these be truths, 
how is it that men do not meet them, and 
deal with them as such ? — if lies, why do they 
go to church to hear them, or open a Bible to 
read them ? There is no medium between 
taking this book as the very echo of the Al- 
mighty's voice, or casting it out, and burning 
it, as a hateful and a deceitful lie. "What men 
call fanaticism and enthusiasm in this matter, 
is, in the sight of God, soberness and truth. 
The wonder is, not that men are so much ex- 
cited by thoughts of eternity, but that they are 
not more excited than they are. An infidel has 
made the remark : — " If I thought Christianity 
true, I should live and labour for it night and 
day ; but I do not believe it, and therefore I 
am perfectly quiet." Now, it seems as if many 
Christians who profess to believe it, do not 
believe it. Let me ask you to review the sa- 
crifices you TQake to spread it ; — see what you 



266 REMAINING DUTIES. 

do for it, and you will soon learn what weight 
it exercises over your minds. 

If time be so short, and eternity so great, — 
if we are rushing to eternity, and eternity, like 
a great sea, is rushing upon us, — if we are 
standing upon an isthmus wasted by the floods 
of time, and washed by the tides of eternity, 
ready every moment to shoot into that gulf 
which must be either a haven of bliss or a sea 
of misery, I ask — Are we Christians ? Is the 
atonement not only a dogma in our head, but 
a living and personal trust in our heart ? Could 
we say at this moment, if the heavens were to 
rend, and the earth to be molten, and the stars 
to fall from their courses, and God himself 
were to unveil his throne and summon us to 
appear before it — "1 know in whom I have 
believed ; and I am persuaded that he is able 
to keep that which I have committed to him 
against that day V Can I say : " I am clothed 
in righteousness that the fire will shrink from 
— washed in a blood that makes me so poor that 
Omniscience can see in me no stain ; and,, come 
life, come death, it will be well with me ?" Is 
our trust in that Saviour? Is our belief not a 
speculative, but a personal trust in an eternal 



REMAINING DUTIES. 267 

Saviour — a perfect sacrifice for sin? Are we 
born again ? Is our heart changed ? Men are 
disputing in the present day about rites and 
ceremonies, and, intentionally or unintention- 
ally, disguising this great truth (and the devil 
will let us believe what we like about baptism, 
if we will only let this go) : Except a man be 
born again, he cannot enter into the kingdom 
of heaven// No rite, priest, ceremony, or 
church, can save us. The same Spirit of God 
that shall quicken the dead in their graves is 
the only power that can change our hearts now. 
May we recollect that to be a Christian is not 
to be a patched-up old building — or to make an 
improvement in this nook and in that depart- 
ment — or to lay aside intemperance, and have 
recourse to avarice — or to drive out one wicked 
passion, to bring in another and more " respec- 
table " one, as it is called ; but to be born 
again, to be turned from darkness to light, to 
undergo a process which must be complete, 
total, and entire ; a change properly designated 
by being "born again," all things becoming 
new — a new faith, new hope, new hearts, new 
joy; and only, if we are so justified by that 
Saviour, sanctified by that Spirit, does our hap- 



2G8 REMAINING DUTIES. 

piness begin. If, however, we are sanctified, 
justified, changed, renewed, then we walk the 
world with an elastic step ; we feel the sky to 
be the dome of our Father's house ; and all 
things — wind, wave, storm, pestilence, plague, 
and famine — working together for our good ; 
we feel, too, that as the years of life roll onward 
with greater rapidity, they are only carrying 
us faster to that blessed assembly where old 
familiar faces will again be restored, and Jesus 
shall be seen as he is, and we shall be like him. 



CHAPTER IX. 

" EXCELSIOR." 

" The shades of night were falling fast, 
As through an Alpine village passed 
A youth, who bore, 'mid snow and ice, 
A banner with the strange device — 

' Excelsior!* 

"'Try not the pass,' the old man said, 
' Dark lowers the tempest overhead, — 
The roaring torrent is deep and wide ; ' 
And loud that clarion voice replied — 

' Excelsior ! ' 

" * stay,' the maiden said, ' and rest 
Thy Aveary head upon this breast : ' 
A tear stood in his bright blue eye, 
And still he answered, with a sigh — 

* Excelsior ! ' 

" • Beware the pine-tree's withered branch- 
Beware the awful avalanche ! ' 
This was the peasant's last good night ; 
A voice replied, far up the height — 

' Excelsior ! ' 



270 " EXCELSIOR.' ' 

"A traveller, by the faithful hound, 
Half-buried in the snow was found, 
Still grasping, in his hand of ice, 
That banner with the strange device — 
' Excelsior ! ' 

" There, in the twilight cold and grey, 
Lifeless, but beautiful, he lay, 
And from the sky serene and far, 
A voice fell like a falling star — 

' Excelsior ! ' " 

" If ye, then, be risen with Christ, seek those things which are 
above, where Chrbt sitteth on the right hand of God. Set 
your affections on things above, not on things on the 
earth." — Colos. iii. 1, 2. 

The Apostle assumes, in the words I have 
quoted, that Christ is risen from the dead, and 
that Christians in heart, in spirit, and in affec- 
tion, are risen with Him also. He is risen as 
the " first-fruits," and they rise with Him above 
the world, in spirit, waiting for that day when 
they shall rise not only in soul, but in body 
also : for " all that sleep in their graves shall 
come forth ; and the dead in Christ shall rise 
first." Now, says the Apostle, if this blessed 
Saviour be the God of your love — if He be the 
source of your happiness — if He be that centre 
towards which all the lines and radii of your 
affections constantly converge — if He be risen 
far above the things that are seen, into the 



"excelsior." 271 

realms of things that are real, but now unseen, 
follow him in heart and hope, till that day come 
when you shall follow him in fact. If Christ 
be risen, set your affections upon things that 
are where Christ is, things that are above, and 
not upon things that are where we live, and 
that soon pass away. 

I ask, in the first place, In what sense can it 
be said that the things of eternity — the things 
that are where Christ is — are things above ? It 
does not mean that they are mechanically or 
physically so. There is no more excellence in 
the zenith than there is in the nadir; there is 
no more piety in the heights than in the depths. 
What is above at twelve o' clock to-day is below 
at twelve o'clock at night ; it is, therefore, im- 
possible to construe the word " above" as if it 
meant something mechanically or physically so. 
It is an allusion to something of a sublimcr, 
loftier, and purer import, on which Christians 
are to set their hearts, as the source of their 
happiness and joy. An unregenerate man would 
be no nearer heaven if he could suddenly unfurl 
an angel's wing, and soar till he seated himself 
upon the most distant fixed star ; and a child 
of God wc«ild be no nearer hell if he could 



272 n EXCELSIOR." 

pierce all tlie geological strata of our globe, and 
locate himself at the very centre of it. It is not 
height, or space, but it is character, that makes 
happiness. " Heaven/' says Dr. Chalmers, "is 
not so much a locality as a character." They 
that have that character shall find heaven every- 
where; and they that have it not shall feel 
nothing but hell everywhere. Misery grows on 
all trees, is reflected from all objects, is heard 
in all tones, to the eyes and ears of the lost; 
and, on the other hand, joy sparkles in the 
height and in the depth, grows upon every 
bush, is eloquent in every utterance, in wind 
and wave, and comes doAvn from the sky, and 
emerges from the earth, and from all things, to 
them that are the children of God, and are the 
called according to his purpose. Make you 
sure of being where Christ is ; and it matters 
not where the locality be, the happiness must 
be perfect. Run the risk of being where Christ 
is not ; and it matters not if you are amid the 
bloom and the unfolding glory of Paradise 
itself — you would drink nothing but streams of 
bitterness, and breathe nothing but a perpetual 
curse. 

Man is a bundle of things called " affections;" 



273 

and, by the very nature and constitution of his 
being, he must set these affections upon some- 
thing. We can no more strip man of his 
affections (far less so, indeed,) than of his 
senses. In order to avoid sin, we do not say to 
a man : " Shut the ear, pluck out the eye ;" 
but we say : " Open the ear to what is good, 
and the eye to what is pure, and beautiful, and 
holy." So we speak of the affections : having 
these affections, there is given a prescription, 
not for their extirpation, but for their applica- 
tion to that which is good and holy. Man will 
cease to live the instant that he ceases to love : 
love he must; his excellency is in the exercise 
of his affections, — his God is the object on 
wlych his holiest affection should repose. There 
can be no such thing as a vacuum in the human 
heart ; there can be no such thing as love with- 
out an object. The Apostle Paul knew this 
fact, and he prescribes, not for the extinction of 
the affections, but for their refinement, their 
elevation, their resting upon objects meet and 
worthy of so great and glorious things. 

Thus Christianity has no sympathy whatever 
with Stoicism. The old stoic insisted that man 
should not laugh, nor weep, nor cry, nor feel ; 



274 

and that the perfect man was he that made the 
greatest possible approximation to a marble 
statne : this is nothing like Christianity. The 
epicurean, on the other hand, said man should 
eat, and drink, and laugh, and make the most 
of his senses while he had them, knowing 
that to-morrow he must die. The one system 
wished man to be a statue ; the other would 
have reduced him below the swine or the beasts 
that perish : the one regarded him as reaching 
the highest excellence when he had become cal- 
lous to everything ; the other regarded him as 
reaching his highest happiness when he gave 
licence and scope to all the depraved and fallen 
passions of his nature. God says : " Be not the 
stoic, but love." God says : " Be not the epi- 
curean, and love the sensual ; but be the Chris- 
tian, and love the holy, the beautiful, the good, 
the true." Have affections : exercise your affec- 
tions ; they need training, not extirpating ; se'„ 
your affections upon things that are above, not 
upon things that are below. 

It is not alleged that things below are in all 
respects bad, and in no respects to be loved. 
On the contrary, "Thou shalt love thy neigh- 
bour as thyself." Parents may love their 



275 

children : a professional man may love his 
profession ; a scholar may love his studies ; 
and a rich man may love, in its place and 
measure, the wealth that God has given him. 
You may love all things below; there is no 
sin in that : the sin lies in loving them exces- 
sively. The apostolic prescription is not to be 
understood as if enjoining us to shut our eyes 
to all that is beautiful on earth, in order that 
we may open them to all that is more beautiful 
in heaven; he does not mean that we are to 
shut our ear to every sound of time, in order 
that we may hear the harmonies of eternity 
only : but it does imply that we are to give the 
supreme place in our affections to things above ; 
that the sovereignty within us is to be from on 
high, and not from below ; that we are to love 
less — vastly less — the things that are seen, and 
infinitely more the things that are unseen, 
which endure for ever. So we read the pas- 
sages which fanaticism has often misconstrued. 
" Labour not for the meat that perisheth, but 
for that which endurtth to everlasting life." 
We do not learn that we are not to work for 
our bread ; for God himself has told us that " if 
a man will not work, neither shall he eat :" but 

t.2 



276 " EXCELSIOR." 

that we are to labour less for the bread that 
perislietli than for the bread that endureth unto 
everlasting life. "Whosoever will be my dis- 
ciple must hate his father, and mother, and 
sister, and brother, yea, his own life also," does 
not mean that we are literally to hate them ; but 
that, so superior is to our love to the unseen, and 
so inferior in comparison our love to the seen, 
that the latter may be called hating, and the 
other, from its intensity, loving. The language 
is evidently comparative; therefore it means, 
" Set your affections far less upon things that 
are seen ; set your affections far more strongly 
upon things that are above, unseen, and eternal." 
Nor are we taught in the Scriptures that all 
things which are below are in themselves sinful. 
There is nothing sinful in a beautiful flower, or 
in the glorious expanse of the sky, when lighted 
up with all its lamps ; there is nothing sinful 
in beautiful music, in exquisite poetry, the 
purest or the intensest eloquence. All these 
are in themselves sinless. Rational men are 
sinful ; irrational things are only suffering. We 
are the sinners ; nature, in the rebound of our 
sin, alone is the sufferer. When, therefore, we 
look at nature, or look at any of the things we 



"excelsior." 277 

have mentioned, and love them, we are not to 
regard them as sinful, and suppose the love of 
them to be sinful ; but we are to feel that they 
are only made sinful when they exhaust our 
affections, and leave none for God ; when they 
absorb all our love, and the dregs of it only 
are bestowed upon the things that are above 
and unseen. 

This, therefore, leads me to this great prac- 
tical lesson — that the sin and danger of man are 
less in loving, or setting his affections upon 
what is sinful, and more in loving, or setting 
his affections excessively upon what is good and 
lawful. There are men that perish by loving 
the sinful, and living in it ; but there are ten 
times more that perish by loving to excess the 
perfectly lawful. Whatever that thing may be 
— if it be a child, or a fortune, if it be wealth, 
or literature, or fame, if it be any thing upon 
earth that is loved more than God — it becomes 
your god, that is, your idol; and you are as 
truly and strictly an idolator as if you rejected 
the living God, and worshipped Diana of the 
Ephesians, Jupiter, Juno, or Mars. All must 
have noticed, in perusing the parables of our 
JBlessed Lord, that the constant obstruction to 



278 " EXCELSIOR." 

the full reception of the truth recognised by 
him was not living in sin, but loving in excess 
things that were lawful. What was the excuse 
of one ? " I have married a wife." That was 
perfectly lawful; but excessive conjugal love was 
his sin — " Therefore I cannot come." Another 
said: "I have purchased oxen." That was 
perfectly lawful; but here was the perversion 
of the lawful to the disobedience of Christ — 
" Therefore I cannot come." Another said : 
" I have purchased a piece of land." That, too, 
was perfectly lawful ; but his inference was the 
peril of the purchase — " Therefore I cannot 
come." It was on this account that our Lord 
said : " Whoso loveth father, or mother, or 
sister, or brother, more than me, cannot be my 
disciple." For whatever we love more than 
God comes to be the sovereign in our heart, 
and the antagonism from that moment begins 
which must issue in the supremacy, absolute 
and exclusive, of the idol, or in the supremacy, 
absolute and exclusive, of the Lord Jesus Christ. 
" No man can serve two masters :" this is a 
great law. No man's bosom has more than one 
throne, and two cannot sit together upon that 
throne; it must be occupied by the Lord that 



279 

raised it, or He will leave it alone, and let it be 
occupied by an idol. The Pantheon of old, 
which was dedicated to the gods of the heathen, 
was willing enough to admit Jesus Christ into 
a niche in it, and to give Him the reverence due 
to Him as one of the " divi major es ;" but the 
Christian said : " Christ must have all the Pan- 
theon for His palace, His sanctuary, and His 
possession, or He will have no niche or spot in 
it at all." It is so with the human heart : 
Christ must have all, or he will have none of it. 
" Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy 
heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy strength." 
Let us notice, in the next place, God's way 
of drawing man from loving the things that are 
below, in order to love the things that are v 
above. What is his plan ? Not that which we 
preachers sometimes in our ignorance pursue, 
of depreciating the things that are below ; but 
the far sublimer and the far more effective plan 
which we too rarely adopt, of exalting, elevat- 
ing, magnifying the things that are above. If 
one were to preach till Doomsday against the 
love of money, and try to prove what a worth- 
less thing it is, all the recollections of each soul 
would rise up, and say. — "We know that 



280 

money is a very valuable thing — that we can- 
not get through the world without it — that we 
cannot pay our debts, cannot feed our family, 
cannot clothe ourselves without it;" and all 
such preaching against money and the love of 
money would be utterly vain — nay, possibly, it 
would only make people grasp it the more, un- 
der the impression that it was threatened with 
peril by the aggression made by the preacher 
on it. The plan God pursues is not to depre- 
ciate money, not to say it is worthless, but to 
enlarge upon the unsearchable riches, to point 
out the superior and the nobler grandeur of 
the heavenly, and, by the application of the 
loftier liking, to dislodge and weaken the 
lowlier liking ; by the brighter light to put out 
the darker light ; and so to captivate with the 
charms of the things that are above, that the 
things that are below shall grow pale and 
worthless beside them. A glow-worm shines 
very beautifully in a black night ; but when the 
moon rises, or the sun shines, its light goes. 
The lamp burns, and gives light to the room 
admirably before sunrise ; but the instant the 
sun rises, the inferior light is extinguished. Do 
not put out your lamp during the night, for 



" EXCELSIOR." 281 

tliat will leave you in darkness, but let the lamp 
burn till tbe sunrise, and the sun will put it 
out, supersede it, and render it worthless by 
rendering it unnecessary. So it is in dealing 
with those who are attached to ambition, to 
wealth, to the world ; it is not by depreciating 
to excess the object they are now attached to, 
but by unfolding, in all their magnificence and 
splendour, the things that are above, and bring- 
ing these, in all their glory, into juxtaposition 
with the things that they love, that the poor 
and paltry lights of time will become dim in the 
midst of the intenser splendours and dawning 
glories of the things that are above, and eternal. 
I need not try to enumerate the things that 
are above. I must, however, mention a few, 
for though we can love the unseen, we cannot 
love the unknown. You, dear reader, will never 
love the things that are above by my simply 
pronouncing their preciousness ; you need to 
know what they are : and my exposition of their 
excellency and glory is designed to raise you, 
by the blessing of God, above the world, into 
communion with eternal things — to lead you to 
plant your strong hopes and your enthusiastic 
sympathies far beyond the visible diurnal sphere ; 



282 

so that when death comes there will be no 
rending and snapping of those ties that knit 
yon to the earth — all will be already loosened, 
and the strong and elastic ties that knit you to 
glory will put out all their attractive energy, 
and you will rise as on angels' wing, till faith 
is lost in fruition, and things below are merged 
in things that are above. We may love, then, 
I have said, the unseen, but we cannot love 
the unknown. 

Need I state that the choicest of all above 
is a Saviour — Christ the Lord ? " If ye be 
risen with Christ seek those things that are 
above." Why? Because he is there. Those 
songs in heaven are so musical because He is 
the key-note — those hymns that are sung are 
so precious, because He is the object of the 
adoration — those scenes of glory and of beauty 
portrayed by the Apocalyptic pen are so attrac- 
tive, because they lie in the light of His coun- 
tenance — that throne is so august, because He 
sits on it — that glory is so bright, because the 
glory of His people Israel is the substance of 
it — and all Heaven is so dear to me, because 
He who has washed me in His blood, who 
has clothed me in his righteousness, who has 



283 

inspired me by His life, who sustains me by 
His strength, and draws me by the cords of 
love, is there. " Whom have I in Heaven but 
Thee V And who was it that said so ? David. 
But David, it is perhaps objected, had nobody 
else in heaven. You recollect that the child 
who was taken from him in chastisement of his 
sin was there, and that the consolation David 
felt was : " I shall go to him, but he cannot 
come to me." David had his child in heaven, 
and yet he could say : " Whom have I in 
heaven, O Christ, but thee ?" The child was 
lost in his presence and amid the attractions of 
that Saviour who was to him more than parent 
or child. " There is none upon earth," he said, 
" that I desire besides Thee ?" Perhaps David 
had nothing on earth worth desiring. Not so. 
He had a throne, a kingdom, an attached and a 
loyal people, the homage and the eclat of many 
servants and subjects : and yet David, beside 
his throne, his crown, his grandeur, his vic- 
tories, his praise, his renown, could say : " There 
is none upon earth that I desire besides Thee." 
Do we not observe the beautiful distinction 
which is made in these words of David ? When 
he speaks of heaven, he says : " Whom have I ?" 



284 

but when lie speaks of the earth, he says : 
" There is none I desire besides Thee ?" Earth 
is the place of desiring — desiring that we can 
never gratify ; heaven is the place of having — 
full and perfect fruition of more than we have 
ever dreamed of. 

In heaven, too, amid the things that are 
above, there is an " inheritance incorruptible 
and undefiled," a crown of glory, mansions of 
peace — a rest that remaineth for the people of 
God ; a new song, the glorious company of the 
apostles, the noble army of martyrs, the goodly 
fellowship of the prophets. There is there a 
better country, our Father's house, the recom- 
pense of reward, the Paradise which Paul saw, 
but which Paul was unable to describe. There 
is there the place where all fears have fled, 
where all doubts are dissipated, where all 
problems are settled, where is the solution of 
every enigma, the repose of every faculty, the 
rest of every affection, the everlasting home of 
the immortal and redeemed soul. Set your 
affections upon the things that are above, not 
upon things that are below. 

This command of the Apostle implies that 
things above are ours. We may not covet what 



"excelsior." 285 

is not ours ; to wish what we have no right to, 
is to break the express commandment of God. 
Are these things ours ? They are a Christian's; 
for " all things are yours ; Paul, or Apollos, or 
Cephas, or life, or death •" it is your inherit- 
ance — " an inheritance prepared for you before 
the foundation of the world ;" it is an inherit- 
ance that Christ has gone to make ready — 
11 1 go to prepare a place for you." Therefore, 
these things are ours ; and, being ours, we may 
aspire to them as our ultimate and glorious 
reward. 

In what shape and in what sense are they 
called things above ? I have said already they 
are not mechanically or physically so ; because 
there is no moral excellence in height, and 
there is no moral degradation in depth. They 
are things above, in that they are above all 
change. The region of vicissitude is here ; the 
realm of changelessness is where Christ is. 
There, not a leaf fades, not a flower withers, 
not a fruit corrupts ; but all fair and beautiful 
creations, placed as they are far above the 
region of storm, retain their amaranthine 
beauty, and bloom in an unshaded and unsus- 
pended glory for ever and ever. It is very 



286 

different here : the loveliest things are here the 
fleetest, and the things we love the most are 
the very things that are most speedily snatched 
from us. But there, things are not only above 
all change, but they are above all death, all 
destruction ; they last for ever and ever ; it is 
" eternal joy;" it "fadeth not away." The 
last flame will pierce our fire-proof boxes, and 
calcine our title-deeds, and reduce to dust the 
homes we have reared, and Avhich we thought 
would last for ever ; but neither flame nor flood 
can reach that better land : the things that are 
above are beyond the reach of the flame and 
the rush of the wave : they are laid up in the 
presence of God, sharing in His immortality, 
coeval with His eternity. They are also things 
above in this sense — that they are above all 
" that eye has seen, that ear has heard, or that 
heart has conceived." I have no doubt that in 
this world there are deposited elements of a 
grandeur now unknown to us — such as we have 
never dreamed of. Everything in this world 
is, at present, under the repressive power of the 
curse. Why happens it, in winter, that the 
flowers do not burst forth into bloom ? The 
frost and cold keep them down ; and what these 



287 

do physically, I believe the curse that is upon 
the earth does morally. But the instant the 
curse shall be removed, I have no doubt this 
world will burst into a beauty, and be covered 
with a bloom, that eye has never seen, nor 
heart, in its happiest imaginings, ever dreamed 
of. We are in a cold, bleak, wasted climate, 
and we do not know what true beauty is : we 
have still less a conception of what the ultimate 
glory will be : we can only guess at it. Some- 
times we may have a glimpse of it, when we see 
the wild rose, by the art of man, cultivated into 
the magnificent one of our garden ; or when we 
see that the peach, which was once a poisonous 
berry used by the Indians to envenom their 
arrows, has become so much changed by man's 
skill. Such developments are permitted, in 
order to give us evidence of what latent capa- 
bilities are in nature, and what this world may 
yet burst and bloom into when the curse shall 
be removed, and the sunshine of the Sun of 
Righteousness shall fall upon it for ever. So 
those things that are above, are above what eye 
has seen, what ear has heard, what heart has 
conceived. Nay, more, it is not improbable that 
we shall have senses added to those we now 



288 

possess, that will open to us scenes and vistas 
of magnificence and grandeur which we have 
not the least conception of at present. We 
have now five senses ; but who knows hut there 
may be, in another state, ten, twenty, or twice 
twenty? It may be, that when man is raised 
from the dead in his glorious body, God will 
unstop all the chambers of that mysterious 
organ that are now still, because death and sin 
are in it, and that we shall have senses, and 
perceptions, incomprehensible now, and behold 
visions and scenes too bright and beautiful for 
us to bear at present, of which the Apostle 
Paul said, when he had but a glimpse of the 
glory, as he stood upon the outskirts of 
Paradise : " I saw sights that it is not given 
for man to speak of," or for man to commit to 
writing. 

Another reason for setting our affections 
upon these things, is the fact that they grow 
in importance every day; and, the longer we 
live, the deeper is the interest in them that we 
have, or ought to have. Rome, and Babylon, 
and Jerusalem, have all passed away; Nineveh, 
Thebes, Palmyra, Memphis — all that was great 
and illustrious in ancient story is gone, and 



289 

scarcely a wreck of them remains. Narrow 
your vision, and take a retrospect of your own 
life, even. Let the youngest or the oldest man 
take a retrospect of a few years : the changes 
that have occurred will startle, and sometimes 
sadden you. Go, after a short time, to the 
place of your boyhood : the school is brightened 
by other faces ; the university is crowded by 
other students ; the old man that you knew 
there is gone, and the venerable minister that 
preached there has passed to his account ; and 
along the streets are rushing new currents of 
new faces all strange to you ; and of the re- 
mains of that busy day in which you played a 
part, the few that survive are shut up in their 
closets infirm, sick, and dying ; telling us, as if 
in one piercing voice, " Set not your heart 
upon things that slip from you the instant 
that you see them ; but oh ! set it upon things 
that are above, that endure for ever and 
ever." 

It appears to me as if the bright flowers 
that burst forth in every place, in the season 
of spring, were teaching us a lesson that the 
blindest may read — that the fairest and love- 
liest things must soon fade. It seems to me 

u 



290 

that when the earth in summer shoots forth at 
once all her hidden and mysterious glories, her 
riches and her beauty, in flower, in grass, in 
wood, and herb ; and afterwards, in autumn, 
draws them all back again into her bosom ; she 
gives us an idea of what she can produce, and 
at the same time she forbids us to fasten our 
affections upon them, since these are but the 
vision of an hour, and the earnest of the future ; 
we must look beyond them to flowers that never 
fade, to a spring and summer that never know 
an autumn. 

Another reason for setting our affections 
upon things that are above, is found in the 
fact that many whom we have loved upon earth 
have preceded us, and pre- occupied the home 
to which we are now aspiring. Is it not true 
that the world becomes to you, aged man, more 
and more like a foreign laud, and heaven, in 
your best apprehensions, more like a home and 
a native place ? Is it not true, at this moment, 
that friends, and children, and fathers, and 
mothers, and sisters, and brothers, are all in 
heaven, and that only a few recent strangers, 
upstarts and youths, are your companions upon 
earth ? Where a man's family is, there a man's 



291 

home is. Home is not made up of bricks and 
mortar, or of rafters, and timbers, and iron, 
and stone : wherever the family is, there the 
home is. How joyful is the fact that our 
home is gradually evanishing from the earth, 
like a dissolving view, and daily developing 
itself in the skies, an everlasting scene ! If a 
mother has seen her children successively emi- 
grate to Australia — that land of enterprise in 
the present day — she will soon gather up her 
last treasures in her present abode, and sail 
to find her roof- tree and her fire- side in the 
far-distant land that once was the stranger- 
land, but is made now, by those who have 
pre-occupied it, the home where her heart is. 
If it be so in these things, should it not, may 
it not, be yet more so in better and brighter 
things ? Our home is beyond the stars ; the 
holy and dear group that constitutes its' charm 
and its attraction is constantly accumulating 
there. Set your affection, then, upon things 
that are above, and not upon the stranger — the 
growingly stranger — things that are scattered 
at your feet below. Our property, too, is in 
heaven. If property is left us on earth, we 
go to the place where it is, and take posses- 

u2 



W2 

sion of it. We are the heirs of God, and 
the joint-heirs of Christ : our possession, our 
property are all amid the things that are 
above. 

Seeking things above casts an ennobling 
influence upon him that seeks them. We can 
almost know the man whose heart is in the 
world, by his downward look; and we can 
equally know, by his bright eye and upward 
look, the saint whose heart is in heaven. We 
can thus know almost by his appearance the 
man who sets his affections upon things that 
are above, as distinguished from the man who 
sets his affections on things that are below. 
The ardent and absorbing pursuit of money 
makes a man's face repulsive, as it hardens his 
heart, and degrades and degenerates his nature. 
The lofty aspiration toward that which is be- 
yond the world, and in the presence of God, 
casts an ennobling aspect on the countenance 
that thus looks sun- ward, and raises that man 
from herding with the beasts that perish, to 
walk as a son of God, and sojourn with the 
heirs and children of the Most High. 

Setting your affections on things above is the 
surest way to find successfully the things that 



293 

are below. If we set out to mind our own 
things first, we shall probably miss our own and 
God's too; but if we set out to find God's 
things first, we shall gain His, and certainly our 
own too. He that seeks first the wisdom of 
Christ will not occupy the lowest place in the 
wisdom of Soloman ; he who seeks first the 
riches of glory, obedience to Christ, sympathy 
with all that is holy, will not least efficiently 
discharge the dignities, the duties, and the 
responsibilities of this world. To steer our life 
without any reference to things above is to steer 
the vessel by a sort of dead reckoning. When 
a sailor does this, he calculates the distance he 
has run, and guesses the spot he occupies upon 
the sea; but he who steers his vessel by a proper 
reckoning, looks at the heavenly bodies, and cal- 
culates his exact place, and pursues his course 
direct as an arrow to its mark. By pursuing 
our course by the things that are below, we take 
a sort of dead reckoning, we calculate where we 
are by the distance we have run ; but to pursue 
our course by looking at things above is to take 
a nobler reckoning, and seek direction by the 
loadstars of the sky, not by the guesses and 
calculations of the earth. As sure as we direct 



294 " EXCELSIOR." 

our earthly course by heavenly lights, so sure 
we shall reach that heavenly haven which is 
perfect rest, and reap, at the same time, the 
highest possible amount of human happiness in 
our course through the world to immortality and 
to glory. " Seek ye," then, " first the kingdom 
jf God, and all other things shall be added 
unto you." Set your affections upon things 
above, and things below will fall into their 
proper place. The present will be bright in 
proportion as you bring the future into it ; 
your happiness now will be rich in proportion 
as you draw on the happiness that is to come ; 
things below will be enjoyed in the ratio in 
which you set your affections upon things that 
are above. 

They only are admitted to the things that 
are above in whose hearts things above are 
admitted now. It is not true that we have only 
to cast ourselves upon the floods, and we shall 
be drifted to heaven ; only by steering directly 
and designedly to heaven shall we be sure of 
successfully reaching it. Has heaven entered 
into our hearts ? unless it has, there is no pre- 
sent probability that we shall enter into heaven. 
The heart must rise with Christ, if we hope 



295 

that that heart shall reign with Christ. Our 
career begins in grace, and it culminates in 
glory. Where, then, is our treasure ? What 
is it that we chiefly live for ? There is no doubt 
that every man lives in the future. Not one of 
us is convinced that we have reached that which 
will make us happy. Our life is in the future. 
But what future ? Is it the future of this world 
which is filled with things below, or is it the 
future of yon world which is filled and radiant 
with things that are above ? All earthly things 
are fast breaking up : the knell of doom is 
heard in the palace of the prince, the cathedral 
of the bishop, the chapel of the priest. All 
things now are being shaken, in order to make 
way, I believe, for things that cannot be shaken. 
If Ave belong only to this world in our affections, 
where our only freehold is the tomb, our pro- 
gress in it is only a dead march, and the pulses 
of our hearts are but as the beating of muffled 
drums as we approach to the grave; and the 
spirit that shall separate from the body that is 
consigned to that tomb has no bright prospects 
or sure pledges of things that are above. If, 
my reader, you have sought things that are 
below, and sought tfcem sinfully, you must suffer 



296 

things that are below, and deeper still — " the 
worm that never dies, and the fire that is not 
quenched." Study, then, things that are above : 
seek to know them, to weigh them, to measure 
them, to taste them now ; and you will long for 
that blessed day when you shall be admitted 
to them. 

Seek things above in the Bible : it is the 
mirror of them, it is the chart of them, it is 
the map that portrays them. Seek them in 
the preaching of the gospel. Wait upon the 
preaching of the gospel. No man who honestly 
and teachably does so will come away dis- 
appointed. Seek those things that are above 
upon the Sabbath-day: it is the day for gather- 
ing manna, when heaven is opened. Do not 
desecrate it to crime : do not degrade it to 
amusement ; consecrate it in your hearts, as 
God has consecrated it in His Word, to holy, 
sublime, and lofty purposes. Seek these 
things above all, in and through Christ, the 
Way, the Truth, and the Life; in whom all 
the promises are yea, for whose sake God has 
promised, and in whose name He will assuredly 
perform ; and then, when the things that are 
below have all been consumed bv the last 






" EXCELSIOR." 297 

flame, and things that are above have been 
revealed by its light in their imperishable gran- 
deur, you will bless the day -when you turned 
your backs upon the one, and set your faces 
to the other. 



CHAPTER X. 

THE WORLD-COPY. 

" He walked by faith and not by sight, 
By love and not by law ; 
The presence of the wrong or right 
He rather felt than saw." 

ft And be not conformed to this world : but be ye transformed 
by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what 
is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God." 

Rom. xii. 2. 

This is a singularly difficult prescription of 
St. Paul, liable, as experience shows, to all 
degrees and shades of interpretation, and ori- 
ginating or made to originate all sorts of 
opinions, and perhaps, owing rather to the pre- 
possessions of the reader than the obscurity of 
the words. Generally speaking, almost every 
man professing the gospel has his own standard 
of conformity to the world, which modifies his 
interpretation of the duty here enjoined, and so 
far renders his view different from his neigh- 



THE WORLD-COPY. 299 

hour's. Some think the advice of St. Paul 
relates to the vices and the crimes of the world, 
and to these only : others to the dress and equi- 
page of the world, and that it is therefore a 
duty to assume a permanent plainness, such as 
the Society of Friends adopts. Some think it 
refers to any intercourse with, the world at all ; 
and, therefore, that entering a convent is the 
only way of obeying the injunction : others 
think the words describe a certain fixed terri- 
tory, to overstep which is to enter the realms 
and jurisdiction of the world, as if the separa- 
tion of the Church from the world were capable 
of being fixed by material and mechanical lines. 
We must look at the words of the Apostle not 
in the light of human opinion. To the honest 
mind they are abundantly clear. If, in the 
spirit of St. Paul, we sit down at the feet of 
Jesus, ready to accept his mind and do his will, 
we shall not be left in darkness. 

Is the prescription to be limited to the days 
of Paul? The great Roman capital was the 
scene at this time of luxury and licentiousness, 
ambition, vain-glory, corruption. It is plainly 
applicable to that age : this is a fact we need 
not dispute. To protest against the principles 



300 THE WORLD-COPY. 

that reigned in that ancient capital — to retreat 
to the utmost extent from the objects pursued, 
the scenes frequented, and the paganism in- 
dulged in, "was a clear duty a Christian could 
not and would not debate. The insulation of 
the Christian character there and then was 
essential to its very existence. 

But the application of the duty to the first 
century, however just, was not limited to it. 
It is laid down as broadly as any other precept. 
Latitude and longitude, time and place, do not 
govern, but are governed by, Christian truth. 
It is surrounded by, and there taught as co- 
equal with, similar texts : — " Love not the 
world." " The friendship of the world is en- 
mity against God." Whoso is a friend of the 
world is the enemy of God." As long as there 
is a church and a world, an army of living 
spiritual men, and a body of carnal and earthly 
men, so long the Apostle's prohibition will 
remain. 

What part of Christian morality does it 
belong to ? 

It is plainly not its design to denounce open 
and flagrant and obvious sins; against these 
there are express prohibiting laws. 



THE WORLD-COPY. 301 

It cannot be intended to teach Christians 
that they are in no respect to agree with the 
world,, or that contrariety to the world is to be 
their rule in all things. This would be absurd, 
because necessitating sin ; if temperance is prac- 
tised by the world, we are not to be intemperate ; 
if courtesy is its delight, we are not to be rude ; 
if industry is a worldly virtue, it does not there- 
fore cease to be Christian. 

The prohibition plainly relates to a territory 
in the Christian walk which no law or statute 
can otherwise cover ; it deals with modes of life, 
intercourse with society, rules of business, and 
other things occurring on the border of Chris- 
tianity and the world. It is the complement of 
the decalogue. It is what a Christian falls 
back on in case of doubt or perplexity. It deals 
with the more delicate and less easily defined 
duties of the gospel. 

This prohibition supposes a distinction and 
difference between Christ's Church and the 
world, or a Christian and a worldling. Their 
character, course, principles, direction, motive, 
and destiny, are opposite. Regeneration of 
heart makes a tremendous difference.. It is no 
ecclesiastical arrangement, no sacramental dis- 



302 THE WORLD-COPY. 

tinction, no conventional and outward feature, 
but a deep, thorough, inner transformation, 
that goes through and moulds and inspires the 
whole man. Surely the change is no slight or 
superficial one, to Create which the Son of God 
came from heaven and was crucified; yet he 
gave himself for us, that he might redeem us 
from all iniquity, and purify to himself a pecu- 
liar people, zealous of good works. We are 
declared to be "a, chosen generation, a royal 
priesthood, a peculiar people." This is not 
empty language. The marks are sharp and 
clear, and well defined. 

The world has its distinctions and differences. 
One section has laws of honour — another laws 
of fashion — another certain conventional statutes 
or usages. Some outward aspects are occasion- 
ally the same, both in the Christian and man of 
the world ; but in the one case they are put on, 
in the other they originate from within. 

There is an illustration of this subject on a 
national scale in the case of the Jews. They 
were hedged round by peculiar rites, ceremonies, 
laws, interdicted from conformity to the customs 
of the nations, marriage, or affinity, or compact, 
all for one definite end, that they might not fall 



THE WORLD-COPY. 303 

into the idolatry of the nations. This distinc- 
tive arrangement was made, in order that the 
guardians of the sacred volumes should preserve 
entire separation from the infection of the 
Gentiles. — Levit. xxvi. 12; 2 Cor. vi. 17. An 
humbler exemplar is found in Sparta, originated 
by Lycurgus.* His design was to raise a war- 
like, hardy, ;.nd powerful nation. He strictly 
interdicted all intercourse with Athenian philo- 
sophy and Corinthian splendour. This he did, 
not because he condemned or approved either, 
but because separation from both was essential 
to his object. He did not contradict their cus- 
toms for contradiction's sake, or accept them 
because they accepted. He adopted what sub- 
served, and resigned what opposed, his end. So 
must it be very much with us and the world. 
What in the world is plainly condemned in 
Scripture, there is no difficulty about. In such 
a case, clean renunciation is our only course ; 
but what we are speaking of are such things as 
are not even named, or condemned in the Word 
of God, or that territory, in short, which is not 
covered by any positive law in the Bible. In 
such cases the question is — Does this in any 
* I am indebted to Barnes for this illustration. 



304 THE WORLD-COPY. 

way subserve the purposes of my conversion, 
destiny, and duty? Will this impede or ad- 
vance, cool or increase, reli ious feeling ? When 
there is no positive interdict in Scripture, the 
inquiry must be — What is the moral and spi- 
ritual influence of this ? How far will this 
either glorify God, or convert sinners, or build 
up souls ? The tendency and end in such cases 
is the test. We may determine the nature of 
things innocuous and indifferent in themselves, 
or unnoticed in the Bible, by their tendency. 

We are not here taught that we are to 
renounce all that the world has and is. This 
world puts on many things that in your case 
originate from Christian principle. We are not 
to live in a hut, because men of the world live 
in palaces ; or to be clothed with rags, because 
men of the world wear purple. Christianity 
does not Macadamise the social system — it is 
not a leveller. Were Christianity universal in 
its deepest influence and force, still there would 
be rich and poor. It demands that the rich 
Christian should no more live as the rich world- 
ling, and that the poor Christian should no 
more live as a poor worldling, but each in his 
place show what Christianity is, and does for him. 



THE WORLD-COPY. 305 

It is clearly taught, that we are not to regu- 
late our opinions and feelings by those of the 
world. They live in and for the present. 
Pleasure is their supreme aim, and end, and 
effort. To be admired, caressed, and courted, 
as beautiful, brave, and gay, is all their desire. 
To enjoy themselves, to eat and drink, to amass 
money, is their absorbing aim. Do not say, 
Christians do so. Professors, only, not Chris- 
tians, do so. All this gaiety is a sad procession 
— the splendour of a perishable spangle. We 
are not to join in it, we are not to adopt their 
feelings, their creed, or their course. They 
may call you singular, but you cannot help it ; 
it is Christianity. You have a grr.nd object 
before you, which shapes and tones your life; 
your maxims are in the Bible, your opinions 
are drawn from it. 

Not to mingle in associations with the world 
which are inconsistent with the grand end, and 
object, and duty of a Christian, is one element 
of nonconformity to the world. His chi:f 
function on earth is, to gloiify God and pro- 
mote the kingdom of heaven. The Spartan 
would at once see, that whether the Corinthian 
was right or wrong in his distinctive and pecu- 

x 



306 THE WORLD-COPY. 

liar habits, such habits were injurious to his 
training as a Lacedemonian hero and soldier, 
and therefore he avoided them. Apply this to 
the theatre. I am not here pronouncing on 
those who frequent and support it. I could 
argue it on this ground, and with worldly men, 
but this is not now my object. I speak to Chris- 
tians and of Christianity in reference to the 
world. Were every drama perfectly pure, and 
every actor of spotless excellence, and were 
no representation permitted that gave wrong 
impressions, caricatures, and exaggerations of 
man, — and, for all I know, it may be so, — were 
the characters that crowd the doors, lanes, and 
lobbies of the theatre all you could wish, yet, 
is going to a theatre — I appeal not to any law, 
but to the delicate taste of a Christian, — in the 
spirit or after the example of Jesus, or in any 
way conducive to your best interests, or a pre- 
paration for prayer or solemn thought ? Could 
you pray before you entered the play-house — 
" Sanctify this spectacle to the glory of Thy 
name and to the good of thy people. Lead me 
not into temptation?" I speak to regenerate 
men — Do you feel at home in such scenes ? Is 
the theatre a relaxation? Is it not rather a 






THE WORLD-COPY. 307 

powerful excitement, from which you do not 
soon recover, bearing to proper recreation the 
relation that ardent spirits bear to water ? If 
frequenting the playhouse cannot be said in any 
way to promote an eternal interest in yourself 
or in others, it may do the reverse. In short, 
does it not seem that to refuse to frequent the 
playhouse is very much in the spirit of these 
words — " Be not conformed to this world." I 
am no Puritan, I am no enemy to recreation, 
no advocate of precision, pretension, affectation. 
But these things are true. 

Not to be prompted by a desire after the 
applause of the world, is very much in the 
spirit of the Apostle's words. To create envy, 
admiration, flattery, honour, is the end of 
worldly living ; and so far as Christians admit 
these into their bosom, so far they are con- 
formed to this world. Newspapers, or their 
encomia or condemnation, is the joy or terror 
of the worldling. Credit for cleverness, talent, 
learning, rank, is the thirst of men of the 
world. I do not pronounce on the merit or 
demerit of the world in this matter, or on the 
purity and exemption from such motives in 
professors ; I merely assert, that all this is very 

x2 



308 THE WORLD-COPY. 

much in violation of the prescription — " Be not 
conformed to this world." To please God, is 
the prayer and labour of the Christian. To do 
his will is his "meat and drink ;" not to he 
moved from this by the world's smiles or frowns, 
is very like Christ. To plant yourself in the 
sunshine of the countenance of God, disregard- 
ing the passing cloud, or the evanescent meteor, 
is duty. 

In the world is our place in Providence ; not 
of, but above the world, is our calling. A man 
may be rich, but yet it may be seen, that the 
interests of the gospel are supreme in his heart. 
Christianity may sparkle in a royal diadem, 
shine through imperial purple, and the monarch 
that wears it be to the Church a nursing father. 
Take the place, high or low, which God, in his 
providence, assigns you, but seek and show in 
it a new spirit and end. In spirit, aim, and 
end, and in career, rise above the world. Live 
not for its prizes, engage not in its pursuits, as 
far as they are peculiar to the world : covet not 
the society of the world, elegant, literary, or 
refined or exalted ; sacrifice these to higher and 
holier ends. Lot went into the world of Sodom 
to make money ; Joseph into Pharaoh's palace, 



THE WORLD-COPY. 309 

and Daniel into the conrt of Persia; in the 
providence of God, the latter were blessed and 
proved blessings to all around ; the former lost 
his family, and almost his own soul. Or if you 
are placed in relationships that cannot be dis- 
solved, meekly bear testimony against the evil, 
and learn, for consolation — " The Lord knoweth 
how to deliver the godly out of all their temp- 
tations." Christianity does not rend asunder 
the ties of social life. In no case so much as 
in permanent relationship with the ungodly, 
does a Christian need more of meekness, gentle- 
ness, patience, and forbearance of the gospel. 

We shall illustrate and fulfil the text, by 
avoiding excess in every lawful matter. It is 
not in doing what is forbidden, but in plunging 
into excess in what is lawful, that the supremacy 
of the world stands forth most clearly. If you 
are young, and have plenty of leisure, you will 
not spend the day in music or painting, light 
reading, shopping, visiting, talking; each in- 
nocuous in its place, and only criminal when 
indulged in to excess. If these become the 
burden of life — the end of its existence, and its 
chief care and employment, you are of and in 
the world, and these things are proofs that you 



310 THE WORLD-COPY. 

are so. Tn the discharge of the various func- 
tions of society, violent political feeling, strong 
party adhesions, great parish oratory, advocacy 
of great reforms everywhere but at home, are 
not presumptive of much spirituality. There 
is risk in all this — these things tend to absorb 
all ; we may forget our citizenship is in heaven. 
Men who hold great offices are bound to give 
their greatest energies to the discharge of such 
duties. But in private life, vehement politics 
and spirituality of heart and mind rarely go 
together. In business we are, as much as lieth 
in us, not to conform to the world. Its anxie- 
ties, trials, difficulties, risks, are very absorbing, 
yet Christians must not be its slaves. Exces- 
sive pursuit of business destroys thousands. It 
is too often laid down, that a fortune must be 
got, and therefore night and day the head toils, 
and late and early the hands work; not an hour 
is spared for recreation; thought, anxiety, ab- 
sorbing pursuit of gain, occupy the whole soul, 
till at length the Sabbath is eyed by Mammon 
as Adam and Eve in Paradise by Satan, 

I fear a vast amount of the modern system of 
trade is antichristian and worldly ; the renun- 
ciation of business is not necessary; reform, not 



THE WORLD-COPY. 311 

renunciation, is duty. The real view of business 
is, to provide food and raiment for ourselves 
and families in our passing through the world, 
and, in this light, business would be part of our 
liturgy, holy as worship, done everywhere to 
glorify God ; a preparation for heaven, which is 
not an asylum into which the victims of the 
world are cast, but a place for which natural 
men are prepared by the Holy Spirit of God. 

In forming alliances, and I allude chiefly to 
the marriage tie — " In the Lord," must be not 
only in the ceremony, but in the parties. The 
unhappiness of which women, fearing God, be- 
come the victims in marriage with vain, empty, 
worldly-minded, or Romish and Infidel men, 
is incalculable. Such marriages brought the 
deluge on the old world. It was such that 
Balaam taught Moab to lay before the children 
of Israel ; still such are precursors of evil, nur- 
series of woe. Beauty, fortune, rank, must, and 
in a Christian will, yield to Christian principle. 

In conclusion, I point to the decision of 
Ruth ; she resigned her country, her gods, her 
earthly prosperity, and clave to Naomi, and 
to Naomi's God — "Entreat me not to leave 
thee, or to return from following after thee." 



312 THE WORLD-COPY. 

Another instance, equally decided, is described 
in these words — " By faith, Moses, when he 
had come to years of discretion, refused to be 
called the son of Pharaoh's daughter, choosing 
rather to suffer affliction with the people of God 
than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season. 
Wherefore come out and be ye separate, and 
touch not the unclean thing, and I will receive 
you and be a father unto you, and ye shall be 
my sons and daughters." " Be ye transformed 
by the renewing of your minds." The first 
movement is an inner one. It begins at the 
centre. There must be an inner and central 
revolution of the heart before there can take 
place an outward revolution in the conduct. 
The love of God in the heart expels the love of 
the world, absorbs every minor preference, and 
eventually reigns supreme. "Except a man be 
born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." 
This great change regulates all. " Whatsoever 
is born of God overcometh the world." Set 
your affections on things above. Let us feel our 
treasure in heaven. Things above are every 
day assuming intenser interest. The rising tide 
is rolling in upon us, and very soon what we 
call life will be covered with the ocean of 



THE WORLD-COPY. 313 

eternity. Our ties are becoming fewer on 
earth, more numerous in heaven. Day after 
day the sky shuts down on fewer of those we 
loved. Seek, in daily and ceaseless prayer, the 
aid and strength of the Holy Spirit of God. A 
Divine power alone keeps us ; — to its fountain 
let us evermore lift our eyes. The night is far 
spent — let this voice, lifted up in its silence, 
penetrate our hearts and shape our feelings and 
our pursuits. 



CHAPTER XL 

THE TRANSFORMED MIND. 

i{ We live in deeds, not years ; in thoughts, not breaths ; 
In feelings, not in figures on a dial. 
We should count time by heart-throbs. He most lives 
Who thinks most, feels the noblest, acts the best." 

" Be ye transformed." — Rom. xii. 2. 

I have now to show the converse of what 1 
have endeavoured to expound in the previous 
chapter. What is it to be transformed by the 
renewing of the mind ? 

If transfigured and renewed, a man is con- 
verted — truly converted. The preacher cannot 
speak too clearly in this matter. He must not 
encourage any resting satisfied midway. To 
be sober, thoughtful, serious, is not all; to 
be anxious, inquiring, awakened, is not neces- 
sarily the renewal of the heart. It is not 
enough to be sprinkled or dipped, either young 



THE TRANSFORMED MIND. 315 

or old ; to be admitted a communicant ; to be- 
long to the purest of Churches ; all this comes 
short of the requirement. " Ye must be born 
again," " transformed by the renewing of your 
mind;" a thorough, inner, radical revolution 
of the soul is required. That change which 
man can neither give nor destroy, which begins 
in the individual's heart, overflows the whole 
life, and ceases not till all within and around 
is transformed, is what is demanded. It is im- 
possible there can be life from the dead, a new 
creature, a total change of our spiritual state, 
and we be ignorant of it, just as it is impossible 
that Spring can come on the earth unfelt by it 
or us, or that slaves can be set free and them- 
selves not know it. 

Profession of the gospel and of adhesion to 
the Saviour is an essential element in this 
transformation. Such profession is indicated 
in these words — " Whosoever shall confess me 
before men, him will I confess before my 
Father which is in heaven." This shows itself 
m union and communion with the people of 
God, in appearing at the communion-table to 
commemorate the Saviour's sacrifice, not to 
obtain love, but to express love to Christ. 



316 THE TRANSFORMED MIND. 

■ "Let your light so shine before men, that 
5 they may see your good works, and glorify your 
Father which is in heaven." This is part of 
Christianity, a plain and obvious prescription 
of it. If our conversion be real, it cannot be 
hidden ; if deep and true, it will break through 
every enveloping wrapping, and shine and 
spread its lustre in the ratio of its depth and 
and vitality — there will be no parade, and yet 
no concealment. All God has made manifests 
itself: — the stars twinkle, the rivers run, the 
flowers bloom, the birds sing, and so Christians 
shine. Conversion is not gold in the mine, but 
in currency. 

Another element in such transformation is, 
a sacrifice of anything and everything plainly 
required in Scripture and for Christ's sake. 
The absorbing love of money will be displaced. 
" Ye cannot serve God and mammon." " Covet- 
ousness is idolatry." Yea doubtless, and I count 
all but loss for the excellency of the knowledge 
of Christ. . .that I may win Christ, and be found 
in him." If he send flame to consume, or open 
the ocean to swallow up your property, you may 
grieve, for this is human ; but you will say — 
" The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away ; 



THE TRANSFORMED MIND. 317 

blessed be the name of the Lord." If the claims 
of charity, or the advocate of the Christian 
mission, knock at your door, you will respond 
— " Welcome." Is he a patriot who sacrifices 
nothing for his country — a friend who will not 
help a friend ? 

Abjuration of every evil course is another 
element in true transformation of soul. Not 
only grossly evil habits will be renounced, but 
deception, chicanery, unfaithfulness, untruth. 
" If thy right eye offend thee, pluck it out." 
No ecstasies of feeling — no excitement of the 
affections — are of any worth in the absence of 
sterling honesty, and integrity of heart and 
life. If the calling in which you now find your- 
self necessitates the violation of the great and 
distinctive features of Christian character, how- 
ever painful, it is a duty to renounce it. " If 
any man will come after me, let him deny 
himself, and take up his cross, and follow me." 
Paul renounced his practice of persecution. 
The Ephesians gave up their curious arts and 
books of magic, however costly. So must you 
give up unholy company. They may have bril- 
liant talent, and acknowledged genius — they 
may be splendid on the turf, or first in the 



818 THE TRANSFORMED MIND. 

chase — most able patrons of the drama — good 
poets and painters — men of rank and family — 
but all these must give way to the higher claims ; 
and, in the absence of Christian character, these 
may be only elements and mines of mischief. 
If unsanctified, though brilliant, society be 
your preference on earth, can yon be said to be 
ripening for that society which is made np of 
the pure, the good, the holy? Abandoning 
even the nearest and dearest rather than aban- 
donment of Christ, mnst be contemplated. 
" He that loveth father or mother more than 
me, is not worthy of me/' " If any man come 
to me, and hate not his father, and mother, and 
wife, and children, and brethren and sisters, 
yea, and even his own life also, he cannot be 
my disciple." 

If onr conscience is convinced that the 
requirements of the gospel, clearly indicated in 
the Word of God, require that we differ in 
opinion from parties with whom we would rather 
agree, and that we should cease to accompany 
them to what our enlightened conscience shows 
to be evil, we must risk such separation. The 
hand must be ever ready to do, and the ear 
ever ready to hear Christ's bidding. This only 



THE TRANSFORMED MIND. 319 

is the attitude of a Christian. Only remember, 
Christ's will is not what man says, but what 
the Holy Spirit has inspired, aid clearly re- 
vealed. If we are transformed, we shall pursue 
a course fitted as much as possible to neutralise 
past wickedness — to repair the injury we have 
done — to repay the obligations we have con- 
tracted — to devote time, and talent, and influ- 
ence, to spread the gospel to which our life has 
been hitherto an obstruction, " redeeming the 
time." The privilege of prayer, so long and 
criminally neglected, we shall seize, and draw 
new strength and blessings from on high. The 
lessons of the Bible, co long unread, will now 
be our meditation by night and study by day. 
The public worship of God, and its accompany- 
ing lessons, and its blessed Sabbaths, we shall 
now covet. This new transforming impulse or 
power will rush into every relationship, and 
office, and retreat, invigorating, adorning, and 
directing. The claims of the Bible, the mis- 
sionary cause, we shall respond to with a libe- 
rality proportionate to our long neglect. One 
who is thus transformed, will be actuated by a 
strong desire to be as eminent a Christian as 
possible. No mere state of safetv from wrath 



320 THE TRANSFORMED MIND. 

will satisfy the Christian; his attitude is up- 
wards, his aim perfection : " Be ye perfect," 
" holy, as He who has called you is holy •" to 
reach the very highest stage of Christian 
character — and to do so he will subordinate all 
on earth. Time will he taken from the count- 
ing-house, not from the closet : when an abridg- 
ment of expenses is necessary, it will be made, 
not in matters of benevolence, but in circum- 
stance. He will rather dim the splendour of 
his equipage, than diminish his donations to the 
cause of Christ. To live for Christ alone is 
necessary, nothing else is. Heaven and earth 
may pass away, but this abidcth. One who is 
thus transformed and renewed will pray for 
increase, and depth, and force of living and real 
religion. It is too plain that there is too much 
deadness, apathy, indecision, and earthliness, 
in every section of the church of Christ. There 
is a crying necessity for another Pentecost. 
The dry, parched land needs showers and dews, 
and thirsts for it. If you be transformed, you 
too will thirst for this ; pray for it, and seek to 
excite an interest in it. If men labour for per- 
fection in science, progress in arts, why should 
not we pray, " Revive thy work in the midst of 



THE TRANSFORMED MIND. 32] 

the years?" One thus transformed will ally 
himself with every Scripture plan for the con- 
version of sinners. To spread that faith whose 
foundations are laid in the love of God, and 
cemented by the blood of the Lamb, is one of 
the very first obligations of the Christian. 
Jesus died to create and bring salvation to us. 
We live to carry it to others. The salt is 
silently to leaven, and the light incessantly and 
clearly to shine. 

The man who makes no effort to make known 
the gospel, has not felt the gospel in his own 
heart as he ought to feel it. Where there is 
no light in the life, there is no warmth in the 
heart. He whose fatal malady has been cured 
by a specific medium, is sure to do his utmost 
to make known its value to similar sufferers. 
The model of a renewed and transformed life 
is the Lord Jesus. Pantheism has its repre- 
sentative-men. Christianity has its represen- 
tative-man — the true God — the true Man — the 
perfect representative of God. How totally 
unlike his age, and yet with nothing singular 
about him, was the Lord Jesus Christ ! how 
little moulded was he by his age ! — hoAV truly 
was the age moulded and elevated by him ! what 

Y 



322 THE TRANSFORMED MIND. 

earnestness of feeling and purpose, and yet no 
fanaticism ! What reverence for order and law, 
yet what superiority to all ontward conven- 
tionalism did he show, when he announced, 
" Blessed are the pure in heart I" What la- 
bour to convert a soul, a single soul ! — what 
calm and awful rebuke of the world's hypocrites ! 
The Christian's model is not concocted in Paris, 
nor made up in London; it is not public 
opinion, nor what newspapers write. Neither 
priest-ridden, nor press-ridden, nor fashion- 
ridden, must a Christian be. As Christ was in 
the world, so should he be in it, not of it. The 
man of Nazareth stands out in his age, distinct, 
clear, protesting. He meant his people to be 
so too — a chosen generation, a peculiar people. 
He is calling a people out of the world — He is 
erecting an empire of love, and righteousness, 
and peace in the heart of the world ; a kingdom 
in the midst of the kingdoms of time, beautiful, 
holy, glorious. Unless we are thus like Him, 
He will say to us, "I never knew you." If 
thus transformed we shall look for heaven, and 
accept and realise justification, on the alone 
foundation of Christ our sacrifice and right- 
eousness. On no ground but this can a Chris- 



THE TRANSFORMED MIND. 323 

tian stand ; even that ground of which not one 
particle or atom is contributed by us in any 
sense, shape, or degree — a righteousness neither 
to be increased, nor decreased, nor diluted, nor 
mixed, nor modified, by anything of ours. The 
clear comprehension of this is our best pre- 
servative from predominant errors and heresies. 
It is, in short, a righteousness on which Paul, 
and Luther, and Calvin stood, and saw forms 
and ceremonies, and church, and priest, and 
sacrament, in proper and true perspective. As 
truly as our sins are laid on Christ, and he 
suffered, so truly his righteousness is laid on us, 
and therefore we have peace. Christ had no- 
thing in him worthy of death when he died — 
we have nothing in us worthy of heaven when 
we enter there. He, the spotless Lamb, wore 
our tainted fleece ; and now we, the sinful and 
stray sheep, return wearing his holy fleece. They 
who are thus renewed, receive, and apply to the 
Bible, as the only source of belief and authority 
in Divine things. Some accept the Bible as an 
excellent book, and admit certain doctrines — 
which are the same as those of natural religion 
•■ — to be true ; but they not only reject soul- 
humiliating and self-renouncing doctrines, but 

y 2 



324 THE TRANSFORMED MIND. 

become indignant and exasperated that such 
truths are pressed upon them. Every doctrine 
contained in the whole Bible is true, divine, 
obligatory. A Christian's enquiry is, What is 
in the Bible ? and what is meant by what is in 
it ? His creed is, not what Augustine says, or 
Bernard thinks, or Luther writes, nor what the 
best men, or most men say, but what God has 
said. We must answer to God for accepting 
any word but His, No commentary of church 
or priest, or father or divine, may supersede it. 
Like Abraham, Ave must tell all these our ser- 
vants to remain at the foot of the mount, while 
we ascend and see God, face to face, and hear, 
not an echo, but the grand original. It is the 
renewed mind that proves what is the will of 
God. To understand the Bible we need no 
pope, nor council, but a new heart. The reason 
of the differences among Protestants is, not 
that the Bible is so dark, but because all are 
not truly regenerate. Then to be transformed, 
or to be a Christian, is not merely an outward 
change or party adhesion — it is a heart and 
treasure in heaven — it is to be raised above this 
world, and to look at all things in the light of 
the gospel. No real or imaginary severity in 



THE TRANSFORMED MIND. 325 

what God says or requires may modify our 
acquiescence. Has God said it? is the only 
question. Many, in every age, have had to try 
themselves, Do I love Christ ? — am I a Chris- 
tian ? and then have marched to torture, rejoic- 
ing to be counted worthy to suffer for " His 
Name's sake." We have no such ordeal at 
present on earth, but there is a yet more search- 
ing ordeal at the judgment-seat ; and if we 
shrink from the scrutiny of the Bible now, how 
shall we shrink from the scrutiny of its Author 
hereafter ? What a necessity is there for honest 
dealing with our souls ! The merchant is not 
satisfied till he knows he is solvent. The land- 
holder is ill at ease till he is sure there is no 
flaw in his lease. The sick man is anxious till 
he has ascertained if his disease be fatal or not. 
How inconsistent are we, if on that point on 
which should be concentrated the intensest 
anxiety — the destiny of souls — nothing but 
indifference should be felt ! Brethren, we must 
know the worst of our case before we ever 
know the best. 

Do not excuse yourselves by pleading the 
inconsistency of professors of the gospel. They 
may be hypocrites, but this is no reason why 



326 THE TRANSFORMED MIND. 

you should be unbelievers. They are perishing 
in the church; this is no reason why you should 
perish in the world. You are answerable to 
God, not for them, but for yourselves. " If the 
righteous scarcely be saved, where shall the 
ungodly and sinner appear?" "Search me, 
O God, and know my thoughts." There is no 
time to lose or spare ; we are rushing towards 
Eternity, and Eternity is rushing towards us, 
and our meeting-place is the judgment seat. 



CHAPTER XII. 

THE TIME-HAZE. 

" Here all our gifts imperfect are, 
But better days draw nigh, 
When perfect light shall pour its rays, 
And all these shadows fly." 

" For now we see through a glass, darkly ; but then face to 
face ; now T know in part ; but then shall I know even as 
also I am known." — 1 Cor. xiii. 12. 

There is much, even in prophecy, clear 
enough to refresh ns with its glorious prospects; 
there is much dark enough to make us humble 
in our ignorance, and to put confidence in Him 
who has promised to make the obscurest things 
plain. It may be said, not merely of prophecy, 
but of all that we know of the doctrines of the 
gospel of Christ, that we see through a glass, 
darkly. It is true, no doubt, that the Bible is 
a revelation of that which is hidden ; it is no 



328 THE TIME-HAZE. 

less true, that it reveals, with great perspicuity 
and plainness, the leading, essential, and funda- 
mental doctrines of the gospel of Christ. But 
beyond the principles it clearly reveals, there is 
a dark and extensive region of the unknown, 
into which scarcely a ray penetrates, and of 
which we can only form a conception by the 
dim and scattered hints of its nature which are 
spread over the sacred page. It is true, there- 
fore, of all revelation, not only of inspired 
Scripture, but of all God has made, that the 
more we actually know, the more we find re- 
mains still to be known. Each great truth 
that God brings within the horizon of our view 
seems to bring behind it a train of deeper and 
more mysterious truths. As each new day 
brings after it a new night, so each new truth 
that we find in the Bible brings after it another 
dark and mysterious truth, which we are unable 
to penetrate. In the future, when we shall 
have no need of the sun nor of the moon, when 
we shall no more see through a glass, darkly, 
w r hen the veil shall be rent and we shall see 
God and all things face to face ; even then, I 
believe, the unknown will be far greater than 
the known. If we only recollect that there is 



THE TIME-HAZE. 329 

an infinite panorama to be revealed, and only 
finite beings to see it, we can easily suppose that 
our state in heaven will at no stage be stationary, 
but ever and ever progressive, and that, as we 
learn what we knew not before, we shall see 
there is more still to be learned — our horizon 
widening as we move to each new height of 
that lofty mount which we shall ascend, reveal- 
ing, at each height we attain, new heights that 
are still to be reached, ever upward and ever 
onward, light and joy increasing as the cycles 
of eternity go round and the new horizon 
spreads before, behind, and around us. And 
thus, then, it will be, that even in that future 
state where we shall see face to face, we shall 
see much unknown beyond that which is fully 
known — the very brilliancy of what we do 
know, making more apparent the darkness of 
that which is beyond us, and which we shall 
afterwards know in succession. 

I may apply the passage very briefly, and 
only very briefly, to creation itself. The most 
enlightened and scientific men will tell you, 
that the more they know of nature and of the 
things of the created w r orld, the more they feel 
remains to be known. It is always the greatest 



330 THE TIME-HAZE. 

philosopher who is most convinced of his own 
ignorance. Sir Isaac Newton, when congratu- 
lated on his vast discoveries, remarked : — " I 
am but like a child gathering shells and pebbles 
round the sea-shore, that are just kissed by the 
waves, while the great unsounded depths of the 
mighty ocean lie unapproachable beyond me." 
He who has made himself most profoundly 
acquainted with all the mysteries in the height 
and depth of this created earth, is the very man 
who will own liow little he does know, and how 
vast is that region that remains yet to be known. 
What little the mathematics, or chemistry, or 
geology, for instance, teach respecting creation, 
leads us to infer, that without these we should 
have very imperfect apprehensions indeed of 
God's works of creation. Nobody can be igno- 
rant, who has a smattering of any of these 
sciences, that they show traces of wisdom, 
footprints of benevolence, which are perfectly 
undiscoverable to the person who is not in- 
structed in them. And yet these sciences, 
which have now risen to so great a perfection, 
are, even in their best state, but dark glasses 
through which we now see very darkly ; and 
when these dark and dim glasses shall be re- 



THE TIME-HAZE. 331 

moved, or when the range of the telescope shall 
be extended, and the power of the microscope 
increased, we shall see, I doubt not, in the 
firmament above, and in the earth beneath, in 
all that is magnificently great, in all that is 
elegantly small, such traces of the wisdom, the 
power, and glory of God, as will overwhelm and 
astonish us. Even now in this world, by the 
aid of art and science, which increase one degree 
our natural focus, we can see overwhelming 
proofs of the greatness of Deity. For instance, 
on a starry night, I look up into the sky, and 
notice those stars that, like altar-candles, burn 
perpetually about the throne of God ; I borrow 
the aid of the telescope, and see that these are 
not mere lights, sparkling as I have descibed, 
but that they are worlds, and that the very 
remotest of these are not the limits, but the 
thin suburbs of creation, — that those that I see 
farthest off by the aid of the telescope are but 
the outposts and the sentinels of that starry 
host that minister perpetually around the throne, 
of Deity. What a conception does such a dis- 
play give me of the grandeur, the glory, the 
wisdom, the power of Him who created all, and 
governs all continually ! 



332 THE TIME-HAZE. 

Fallen as this world is, I have no doubt that 
if we could see it in an intenser light, and not 
through the media of glasses darkly, we should 
witness in it a far brighter revelation of God, 
wise, good, powerful, beneficent, than we now 
see. The fact is, that all we know of creation 
at this moment is most limited; there is 
nothing to exalt us, plenty to humble us. 
The height to which the astronomer has soared 
is but a few miles, the depth to which the 
geologist has dug is but a few feet ; so that the 
astronomer seems to me like one who tries to 
measure the firmament with a foot-rule, and 
the geologist like one that tries to explore the 
bosom of the earth with a taper ; and all that 
they disclose, much as it adds to our present 
information, is what may be expected of those 
who search after God in so dim and faint a 
light. 

It is thus, then, that in looking at creation as 
it is, and in all its provinces, we see but through 
a glass darkly ; a day comes when we shall see 
creation clearly. 

Let us look at the next department of being, 
and see these truths as applied to it. There 
is a Providence, I need not state, superintend- 



THE TIME-HAZE. 333 

ing the movements of planets and the fall of 
sparrows ; ministering to the angel, and feeding 
the wild raven. There is no sneh thing as 
chance in the world. I cannot conceive that 
any man can have a moment's peace who be- 
lieves that anything in the nniverse is left to 
accident, because our experience every day 
proves that little things are the hinges of great 
events — the turning of a corner is the fixing of 
a destiny — a movement to the right or to the 
left the determining of the whole after-career 
of one's life. Let any one look to the least 
event in his history, and he will see, that if that 
event had not occurred, all his biography might 
have been materially altered, either in tone or 
direction. There is no doubt, then, that there 
is a God or a Providence in the least as well as 
in the greatest concerns of life. But when we 
look at the movements of that Providence, we 
are constrained to own, we can only see them 
through a glass darkly. That mysterious suffer- 
ing is not accidental — it is from God ; but why, 
wherefore, and to what end, we see through a 
glass darkly. That severe stroke that swept 
from your eyes the near, the dear, the beloved, is 
all wrapped in mystery ; you have but glimpses 



334 THE TIME-HAZE. 

of its meaning; yon see it through a glass 
darkly. That storm that burst npon yon like 
the thunder- cloud, and washed away the ac- 
cumulations of the honest industry of many 
years, you see through a glass darkly. We 
know not what it is, nor whereto it tends. 
This only we know — that our God awakened 
the storm, our Father commisioned the cloud, 
and that what we do not see now we shall see 
hereafter, when we see no more through a glass 
darkly, but as face to face. 

There is much in every dispensation, there- 
fore, that we cannot now penetrate. We find 
it wrapped in partial mystery, visible only 
through a glass darkly; and such glimpses as 
we do obtain lead us only to long to obtain 
more. But there are certain great facts which 
we can see clearly, such as that " no tribulation 
for the present seemeth to be joyous, but it 
worketh out the peaceable fruits of righteous- 
ness ;" that " all things work together for good 
to them that love God." Many have found 
that the loss of health has been the safety of 
the soul — that the five, the six, the seven 
months that sickness kept them prisoners, have 
been to them the most blessed months that 



THE TIME-HAZE. 335 

have occurred in all their biography. Many 
have felt the loss of the infant to be the weaning 
of their heart from the place that the infant has 
left, and the fixing of that heart on the home 
which that infant has gone to pre -occupy. 
Many have found that the loss of a fortune has 
been the restoration of a soul, and that the bit- 
terest cup had a blessing in it, and the darkest 
cloud a fringe of light, and the blackest sky an 
unseen but true and covenant rainbow, indicat- 
ing that a Father was there, superintending the 
storm, and limiting all its effects. We see these 
things now through a glass darkly ; hence we 
misconstrue ; but when from some lofty pin- 
nacle of the better land we take a retrospect of 
the way that the Lord has led us, we shall see 
that every turn, and winding, and crossing, and 
check, and obstruction, and fall, and sickness, 
and sorrow, were just as necessary to our 
everlasting happiness as that Christ should 
have died, or that the Bible should have been 
written. 

Let us look now at the truths of God's 
Word, and we shall find that these, even, we 
see through a glass darkly. Let me refer to 
the great facts of Revelation, and the applica- 



336 THE TIME-HAZE. 

tion and the truth of these sentiments will be 
obvions immediately. Let ns look through 
this glass at God Himself. How little do we 
comprehend of God ! What do I comprehend 
of a God present in the remotest star, and in 
the minutest particle of dust : a God whose 
centre is, as it has been defined, everywhere, 
and whose circumference is nowhere ? Literally 
nothing. I see God's grand attributes through 
a glass darkly ; and when I begin to think of 
Him, like the ancient philosopher I ask one 
day, and when I have thought that day I must 
ask a second, and when I have thought that, I 
must ask a third; and the longer I think the 
less I know, and the more I must conclude we 
see but through a glass darkly. Let us read 
the nature of God as it is defined more specially 
in the Bible. It tells us, for instance, the Father 
is God, and the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit 
is God, and yet they are but one everlasting 
and glorious God. What do I comprehend of 
this ? Literally nothing. I need not add now 
that it is most absurd for the Socinian to say, 
" I reject the Trinity because I cannot compre- 
hend it." He cannot comprehend Eternity, 
Omnipresence — the attributes he does ascribe 



THE TIME-HAZE, 337 

to God. On such principles, therefore, he 
ought to reject the existence of God altogether. 
What, then, do we comprehend of the Trinity ? 
Very little ; and all the explanations of it I 
have read only make the mystery more appa- 
rent. We see it through a glass darkly. The 
fact is revealed — the doctrine is incomprehen- 
sible. It is not against our reason, but it is 
above it. The Trinity is not a contradiction, 
but it is a truth partly luminous. It is a re- 
velation, but not an analysis. It is so plainly 
revealed, that we can see that it is; but it is 
so obscurely comprehended that we cannot know 
how it is. There is enough revealed of that 
mysterious truth to lead us to adore ; there is 
nothing revealed about it to lead us to be 
curious, to speculate, or to be puffed up. We 
see it through a glass darkly. 

Look at the doctrine of the Incarnation, 
which we think of as a very plain truth ; and 
yet even this foundation of our hopes we see 
but through a glass darkly ! How can the 
Infinite and the Finite coalesce ! How can there 
be the deepest suffering and the highest satis- 
faction ! How want and fulness, weakness and 
btrength, life and death, can meet and mingle 



338 THE TIME-HAZE. 

m one, is a mystery revealed in the Scripture, 
but seen by us through a glass darkly. 

Let ns refer to the work of the Holy Spirit 
of God. We see this only through, a glass 
darkly. It is told us, " Except a man be born 
again he cannot see the kingdom of God." 
Here is a Divine presence, a Divine power 
needed to change man's heart. But how does 
the Spirit act ? how does He bow the will and 
not annihilate it ? how does He restore, retune 
the tangled and discordant affections of the 
heart, not against our will, but with our will ? 
The action we cannot trace, the agent we can- 
not see j the effects alone we can feel : for 
" the wind bloweth where it listeth, and thon 
nearest the sonnd thereof, but knowest not 
whence it cometh and whither it goeth. So is 
every one that is born of the Spirit/ 3 The 
sceptic denies it, the fanatic raves about it, 
the Christian accepts it, and blesses God that 
he knows it in his heart, though he sees it 
through a glass darkly. 

Let ns bring before us two great trnths : the 
Sovereignty of God, and man's responsibility. 
We see these also through a glass darkly. It 
is, for instance, honestly and truly said, (i Come 






THE TIME-HAZE. 339 

unto me, all ye that are weary and heavy laden, 
and I will give you rest ;" bnt it is no less 
honestly and truly said, " No man can come 
unto me unless the Father which hath sent 
me draw him." This seems to be a contra- 
diction, but it is not so. We see the two 
truths, in their points of contact, only through 
a glass darkly ; and in our folly infer a contra- 
diction, where if admitted into higher light, 
we should see all to be harmony and order. 
Again, it is honestly and truly said, " Repent." 
It is no less honestly and truly said, " Christ is 
exalted to give repentance." It is honestly and 
truly said, " Believe in the Lord Jesus Christ." 
It is no less honestly and truly said, " To you 
it must be given to believe." These we cannot 
reconcile ; but they are true, and that man 
acts not only unscripturally, but most unphi- 
losophically, who says — " There are two truths 
which I cannot reconcile; therefore I will reject 
one of them." The true way is — " There are 
two truths which I cannot now reconcile, be- 
cause I see them through a glass darkly. I 
will wait till that glass is broken, and greater 
light shines upon them, and then I shall see 
there is harmony where there now is apparently 

z 2 



340 THE TIME- HAZE. 

discord." The two ends of the chain are dis- 
tinctly seen, one upon the one side of the river, 
and the other on the other side; bnt the in- 
termediate links are lost in the stream of 
mystery that flows between. ^Te see through 
a glass darkly. Take again the efficacy of 
prayer. We are told in Scripture, again and 
again, to pray; yet the more we think of 
prayer, and try to analyse it, the more inexpli- 
cable it seems, on the supposition that God is 
an unchangeable, an infinitely wise God. For 
instance, we might reason in this way : — If God 
sees a fact to be best, and has purposed it, what 
is the use of my praying to Him not to do it ? 
If God has raised a storm, and awakened the 
storm, and placed the ship in jeopardy, what is 
the use of my praying that He will call back 
the winds, and hush the sea, and save the be- 
loved, in the midst of that ship ? God is wise, 
God is powerful, and if it be best which is, why 
should I pray that it should be otherwise ? In 
other words, how am I to reconcile prayer with 
its efficacy, and God with His sovereignty, His 
wisdom, and His power? I see it through a 
glass darkly. This I can read : " Pray always 
and faint not;" and this I can read: " Seek, 



THE TIME-HAZE. 341 

and ye shall find ; knock, and it shall be opened ; 
ask, and ye shall obtain •" and all the instincts 
of my nature prompt me to pray ; all the bid- 
dings of my Bible prompt me to pray. And 
peril aps this may be the solution of the apparent 
contradiction, between the truth that God is 
•wise and good and sovereign, and the fact that 
God answers prayer. It may be His purpose 
to do nothing that is not prayed for, just as it 
may be God's purpose to do that which is in- 
finitely wise, good, and true ; and therefore 
prayer may be reconciled even with other por- 
tions of God's sovereignty. But whether we 
can reconcile it or not, we know this — that it is 
our duty and privilege to pray, and it is God's 
promise to give what we pray for, if it be good 
for us. 

I might allude to many other truths that we 
see through a glass darkly, some of them per- 
plexing enough — for instance, the admission of 
sin into the world. What a mystery is here ! 
Why did omnipotence allow it? Why not 
have preserved the world from its taint, and 
humanity from its havoc? Why must suffer- 
ing, and famine, and wrecks, and battle-fields, 
and sicknesses, and deaths, and sorrows, still 



342 THE TIME-HAZE. 

revel in the midst of the human family, and 
and select their respective victims ? God has 
Omnipotence to prevent it; He has ]ove that 
is infinite : why does he not prevent it ? Why 
should there be any section of God's created 
universe in "which there shall be, for ever and 
ever and ever, the ceaseless moan of despair, 
the awful and agonising cry of unmitigated tor- 
ment ? Why does God suffer any one human 
soul to waste its time in trifles, and to lose itself 
for ever? Why, if God can save all, does he 
not save all ? Why, if the blood of Christ 
cleanseth from all sin, does it not cleanse all 
men from all their sins, without any exception ? 
These are awful and unsounded mysteries. We 
know just as much of them now as we knew 
when we first began to study them. Analogies 
may be quoted, illustrations may be appealed 
to, but we just comprehend as much of them 
now as the first enquirers into them did, or the 
latest will comprehend. All we can say is, that 
clouds and darkness are round about them, and 
that these things we now see through a glass 
darkly. 

But let me add, the unhappiness that many 
Christians frel, arises from their not being satis- 



THE TIME-HAZE. 343 

fied with the clearly revealed, the plainly known 
— and their prying into the unrevealed, which 
we shall not know now, bnt are only destined 
to know hereafter. I do not donbt that, even 
in this dispensation, progress will be made in 
discovering the meaning of many of those things 
which are now inscrutable to ns. I have no 
doubt that progression is being made in the 
understanding of God's Word, just as progress 
is being made in excavating facts and phenomena 
in creation that were hidden before. For in- 
stance, what progress has been made (to take 
one science alone) in astronomy ! The same 
sun that shone on Paradise shines on us ; the 
same Orion, the same Pleiades, that shone on 
Job, look down upon us still : and yet what a 
mighty progress has been made, not in the 
creation, but in the knowledge of these things, 
from the days of Job to those of Laplace and 
Newton ! And may it not be that, without one 
addition to the Bible — without one single book 
added to its contents — we may, in the lapse of 
years, by investigation, by tracing new and un- 
known analogies, by greater and yet clearer 
teaching of the Holy Spirit, come to a concep- 
tion of truths that are hidden in this blessed 



344 THE TIME-HAZE. 

Book, so clear and vivid, that we shall be sur- 
prised we did not see them before? What 
progress has been made in the understanding 
of the Bible, from the days of Ignatius to those 
of Augustine — from those of Augustine to those 
of Calvin — from those of Calvin to the pre- 
sent moment ! They have not discovered new 
truths in the Bible ; but they have placed th3 
old truths in new lights, in new bearings, in 
new relationships, and with a brilliancy and 
clearness of outline, such as those that preceded 
them could not perceive. It is this very idea 
of progress that makes us conclude that the true 
fathers of the Christian Church are the best 
Biblical scholars of the nineteenth century. It 
is a perfect perversion of things to call Ignatius, 
and Augustine, and Jerome, and Chrysostom, 
the fathers of the church. The fact is, these 
excellent men were but the children of the 
church, and were very much mixed up with 
childish things ; and those divines who have 
written upon the Bible, and studied it, and have 
been aided by the Spirit of God, in the nine- 
teenth century, are the true fathers, the only 
ancients of the Christian Church. Augustine 
and Chrysostom had but the same Bible ; they 



THE TIME-HAZE. 345 

had the same intellect; the same throne of grace, 
the same Holy Spirit that we have. We have 
all that they had, and in addition, we have the 
lights of science, the results of patient and 
protracted inquiry ; and the very blunders that 
they made, are the beacons that keep us from 
falling into similar errors : so that the pre- 
sumption is, that we shall have a far clearer 
exposition of the Bible from the learned and 
pious men of the nineteenth century, than from 
those who lived in the dawn, and were less en- 
lightened in the truths of the gospel of Christ. 
Thus, then, notwithstanding all the darkness 
that rests on the facts and principles I have 
indicated, we may, in the lapse of years, and by 
the blessing of the Spirit of God, see truths 
that are now partially known far more clearly 
than we have seen them before, and discover 
in portions of Scripture that have been ne- 
glected or misunderstood, or seen in the mists 
of prejudice and passion, bright and blessed 
truths long hidden, but precious and useful to 
the church. 

This seeing of all truths through a glass 
darkly, and of some truths scarcely at all, 
should lead us to shrink from dogmatising 



346 THE TIME-HAZE. 

where God lias not spoken with the greatest 
plainness. There are some grand, prominent 
truths in the Bible which rise from the level 
like the Alps shining in the beams of rising 
and setting suns, which no man can fail to see, 
and which even the darkest mind can scarcely 
misapprehend ; but in the interstices or valleys 
between, there are minor or subordinate truths, 
partly in the shadow, partly luminous, to be 
seen only at certain angles, and from certain 
points of view, on which we should never 
dogmatise, because Christians equally candid, 
sincere, and prayerful as ourselves, have seen 
them differently, and in a different light. And 
very probably, the reason why we differ in the 
non-essential truths of the gospel, is that we 
look at them from different points of view, and 
through different media. I recollect reading 
the journal of a traveller in a far distant land, 
in which he states that two friends who were 
with him stood one on each side of a tree — I 
forget its name — whose leaves were green on 
the upper surface, and pure silvery white on 
the under surface. The wind blew from the 
one beholder, right in the face of the other, and 
the under part of the leaf was turned to the 



THE TIME-HAZE. 347 

one, while the upper part of the leaf was turned 
to the other. They disputed and argued for 
some time, one asserting that the leaves were 
all white, and the other that they were all 
green; and it was only when a third interfered 
that they discovered that the secret of their 
dispute was the different points of view from 
which they saw the same object, and that both 
were right. It is very much so with the subor- 
dinate and non-essential truths of the Bible ; it 
is thus that we look at them from different 
angles, see them from different points of view, 
through the media of prejudice, passion, and 
prepossession, and differ furiously where we 
should agree to differ in love. But the great 
truths of Christianity are so plain, that we 
should speak of them with no uncertain sound, 
because all who will open the Bible, and 
honestly read, ought to see^ them. On other 
points that are subordinate, we should never 
dogmatise, because men must agree to differ 
about what God has not clearly and plainly 
revealed. This applies especially to prophecy. 
If we see through a glass darkly the great 
truths of the gospel, and the minor truths of 
ecclesiastical polity, it is still more true that we 



348 THE TIME-HAZE. 

see through a glass darkly all unfulfilled pro- 
phecy. Knowledge will increase as the end 
approaches ; and we shall be able to interpret 
Revelation far more clearly as the hour of its 
accomplishment draws near. On all prophecy 
that is not yet fulfilled, we cannot speak with 
too great and tender forbearance. We can see 
clearly certain great outlines in the future, but 
the minutiae predicted in Daniel or the Apoca- 
lypse, no man does see in all their details, and 
no man will see till the very eve of their accom- 
plishment draws near : therefore, if any one 
should profess to lay down a map of the future 
just as confidently as he repeats his creed, and 
assert that he sees the future as plainly as he 
sees the present or recollects the past, he is 
looking at the future with a glass that is his 
own ; he does not look, through God's glass, 
for if he looked through it, he would see these 
things darkly. The fact that he appears to see 
them otherwise, is evidence that he sees them 
not at all as they are to be seen. Let us speak 
of the atonement in terms that cannot be mis- 
understood ; but let us speak of unfulfilled pro- 
phecy with humility and with submission, — 
ever conscious that we may be wrong, ever 



THE TIME-HAZE. 349 

admitting that it may possibly be what we 
misapprehend. 

In drawing some practical remarks from these 
reflections, I may notice that this knowledge in 
part is an evidence, not of the lowness, but of 
the greatness of our origin, and the grandeur 
of our destiny. Animals know all they do knoAV 
in full ; man knows in part. The first impulse 
would be to infer from this, that animals are 
more gifted than we ; but it is not so. The bee 
builds its cell in the nineteenth century just as 
it built it in the first ; and the bird constructs 
its nest to-day just as it will build it while the 
world lasts. They know all they do know in 
full ; and they know no more in the last years 
of their existence than they knew in the first. 
But man knows in part, and the more he knows 
the more he attempts to know : and that which 
seems a symptom of his weakness is the evi- 
dence of his grandeur; it becomes to him, 
therefore, the spring of an endless progression 
— the evidence of a vast capacity of improve- 
ment — the foretoken that the glass through 
which he sees darkly will be broken, and that 
he shall see all things face to face. This assur- 
ance, that we shall see all things as they are, is 



350 THE TIME-HAZE. 

the sure hope which acts like an anchor to the 
soul, and saves it from sinking amid rack, 
and doub f , and difficulty, and darkness. If I 
thought that the present cold and misty dawn 
were to last for ever, I should feel miserable ; 
if I thought that this dark and smoked medium 
through which I see the things of God and 
of glory were never to be removed, I should 
be wretched; but I know that the glass will 
be removed — that the veil will be rent — that 
the clouds will be scattered, and, amid the 
splendours and the noon of everlasting day, 
what I see now so dimly I shall see face to 
face. 

I believe, in the next place, that this pro- 
gressive acquaintance with the truths that we 
know dimly upon earth, and with new truths, 
in heaven and in the future, that we never knew 
on earth at all, will constitute much of the joy 
and the happiness of the saved in glory. When 
we point out to a child the beauties of a flower, 
or the exquisite crystallisations of a mineral, — 
when we indicate to him analogies, affinities, 
and points of contact he never dreamed of, what 
ecstasy does that child manifest ! how is his 
mind enchanted, and how does he express his 



THE TIME-HAZE. 351 

wonder that he never knew or saw these things 
before ! But why did he not know them before ? 
Not because they were not, but because his 
mind was not large enough in its capacity to 
comprehend them. We notice, too, in men of 
ripe age, what ecstasy they feel in adding to 
their stock of knowledge. The student will 
traverse arctic snows, and stormy seas, and 
burning deserts, and leave all man loves at 
home, and face all man dreads abroads, in order 
to find a new plant, or to become acquainted 
with a new mineral — or to see an eclipse, or 
planetary transit, from a new position — or to 
register a new phenomenon — or to do something 
that will add to the bulk and splendour of that 
knowledge which is every day increasing in the 
midst of us ! What joy does it give him to 
catch a gleam of an undiscovered truth ! what 
ecstasy when he has made the discovery i And 
what is all this but a foretaste of that joy and 
rapture which we shall feel in the realms of 
the blessed, when we shall no more see these 
things through a glass darkly ? 

What humility should this fact that now we 
see darkly, teach us ! How little do we really 
know — how much remains to be known — how 



852 THE TIME-HAZE. 

truly is that sentiment which bids us walk 
humbly with our God enforced in all this ! 
God gives us to see even the truths that save 
us through a el ass darkly. 

What charity should this truth teach ! How 
slow should we be to condemn a brother — how 
little should we feel of irritation or exaspera- 
tion of mind because he differs from us — how 
should we try to teach him the more excellent 
way, knowing that we ourselves were once in 
error — how should we agree to differ in things 
that are not vital, when both of us see through 
a glass darkly, and may see through very 
different media ! 

What contentment should this teach us, — 
to be satisfied to see through a glass darkly, 
knowing that the day comes when we shall see 
face to face ! Let us, there 'ore, anticipate that 
blessed day. We are saved, says the Apostle, 
by hope, and that hope is, that the day comes, 
when all will be luminous — when every mystery 
shall be penetrated by a new splendour — when 
the things that lie in the shadow shall be placed 
in the sunshine — when the veil shall be rent, 
and the films and the scales shall be removed 
from our eyes, and we shall be " satisfied," for 



THE TIME-HAZE. 353 

we shall see God face to face, and we shall be 
like him, for we shall see Him as He is. 

Let us rejoice in this, that "blessed are the 
pure in heart, for they shall see God ; and if 
we are in the number of those whose hearts 
have been renewed, whose minds have been 
enlightened, who are made, by that blessed 
Spirit, pure in heart, let us rejoice that we shall 
see Him just as he is. In the meantime let us 
make the best use of what we do know, instead 
of prying into what we cannot know. Let us 
apply heartily, and throughout the whole range 
of our life, what we do know. One truth of 
God's "Word, turned into life, and impressed on 
our walk, our heart, our consciences, and one 
relations to society, may be infinitely more pre- 
cious than twenty truths speculated on, or in- 
tellectually studied, or curiously pried into. 
Let us, therefore, pray that those truths that 
we do know we may be enabled practically to 
follow, and prayerfully to use. That man who 
puts into action the whole of the truth that he 
does know, is the very man to whom God will 
reveal more clearly the thing that he does not 
know. This do we know, " The blood of Jesus 
Christ His Son cleanseth from all Sin." " He 

A A 



354 THE TIME-HAZE. 

that knew no sin was made sin for us, that we 
might be made the righteousness of God by 
Him." " He bare onr sins in His own body on 
the tree." This we do know, that we are in- 
vited to come unto Him, weary and heavy laden 
as we are, and He will give us rest. And this 
we do know, that " except a man be born again, 
he cannot see the kingdom of God." 

May these truths be not only light, but life, 
to us ! may they be not only sounds that rever- 
berate in the ear, or sights that charm the eye, 
but living seeds that germinate in the heart ! 



CHAPTER XIII. 

THE INHERITANCE. 

"So live, that when thy summons comes, to join 
The innumerable caravan, that moves 
To that mysterious realm where each shall take 
His chamber in the silent halls of death, 
Thou go not like the quarry slave at night, 
Scourged to his dungeon, but sustain'cl and soothed 
By an unfaltering trust. Approach thy grave 
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch 
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams." 

" Giving thanks unto the Father, which has made us meet 
to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light." — ■ 
Col. i. 12. 

In the verse I have quoted from Colossians 
we have, first of all, a description of the rest 
that remains for the people of God, under the 
beautiful and instructive epithet, " the inherit- 
ance." We have next the characteristic of that 
inheritance — the "inheritance of the saints in 
light." We have then the names of those who 

aa.2 



356 THE INHERITANCE. 

are appointed to be partakers of that inheritance 
— " saints." We have also their character — 
"meet." Who hath made ns meet [fit, adapted] 
to be partakers of the inheritance of the "saints 
in light. " We also see the Author of it all, 
who has created the inheritance, and lighted it 
np with all its glory ; who hath also made them 
that enter it meet, or adapted, for the inherit- 
ance of the saints in light ; namely, God the 
Father and onr Father. 

This description of the future rest, namely, 
"the inheritance," reveals to us the nature of 
that heaven to which we aspire. Every man 
hopes to get to heaven, as the popular expression 
has it ; but few men consider what heaven is, 
and what they are who have any reasonable 
hope of entering heaven. 

" The inheritance," is an expression that de- 
notes no merit in those that enter it : they do 
not obtain it by toil, by labour, or by purchase; 
it is not something that a servant earns, for 
then it would be wages ; nor something that a 
soldier achieves, for then it would be reward or 
trophy; nor something that a purchaser bar- 
gains for in the market, for then it would be 
the result of a price ; but it is something which 



THE INHERITANCE. 357 

a son, a relative inherits. The very name pre- 
cludes all idea of merit ; and thus, if heaven be 
not a purchase, nor a reward, nor a trophy, but 
an inheritance, it looks as though the inscrip- 
tion, " By the deeds of the law no man can be 
justified/' were woven out of the beams of 
the coming glory, and legible upon the very 
threshold and door-posts of the gate that leads 
to it. A place is inherited by relationship alone. 
The title of a prince or a noble, and his dignities 
and estates, may or may not be deserved, but 
yet they are inherited by his son. The son may 
be unworthy, but he is nevertheless the heir; 
and the idea, therefore, which is meant to be 
conveyed here is, that this heaven is meant 
for those who are the relations of God — those 
who are called the sons of God — the "heirs of 
God and joint heirs with Christ/' who are said 
to have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby 
they cry, Abba, Father. If it be so, before we 
can indulge a well-founded hope that we shall 
be happy for ever, we must first ascertain by 
clear reasoning, by plain Scripture, that we are 
what are here called the sons of God. It is not 
enough to be just, generous, amiable, affec- 
tionate sons — to be domestic men, affectionate 



358 THE INHERITANCE. 

fathers — honourable, benevolent. All this you 
should be, but all this you may be, and not be 
the sons of God. Now, it is a very solemn 
thought that either I am a son of God, and the 
heir of a kingdom that never can be moved • or 
I have no lot or part in this matter at all. There 
is no intermediate spot that one can occupy. 
We cannot say, " I am not, indeed, a son of 
God, but then I am not an heir of misery." 
One or other you must be; and whatever be the 
separation that divides you in human society, 
whether rich or poor, or learned or ignorant, 
there are really and truly but two clearly denned 
classes on earth — those who have the Spirit of 
adoption, and are the sons of God; and those 
who are aliens and strangers, without God and 
without Christ, and without hope in the world. 
If we be the sons of God, the fact that it is 
our Father's home, that it is for relatives, — 
and that those who have preceded us and pre- 
occupied that place are, because the sons of 
God, our brethren — casts a home -like aspect 
over the realms of glory ; and thus, when we 
enter that blessed land, we shall not mingle 
with strangers whom we have never known, 
but be re-united with those happy and rejoicing 



THE INHERITANCE. 359 

bands who have washed their robes and made 
them white in the blood of the Lamb, and 
therefore are before the throne, serving Him 
day and night without ceasing. 

But let us try to ascertain some of the dis- 
tinctive marks of this inheritance, as they are 
delineated in various parts of the Word of God, 
before we study the grand characteristics of 
those who are to enter it, — namely, meetness 
for the inheritance of the saints in light. By 
referring to another Apostle we shall find this 
inheritance described in these words, " An 
inheritance incorruptible and undenled, that 
fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for you." 
Here, then, are its features. First, this in- 
heritance, to which we aspire, into which so 
many say they hope to enter, but into which 
the sons of God alone will be admitted, is de- 
scribed as an inheritance that is incorruptible. 
What a lofty attribute is this ! All things that 
we see here are tainted by corruption ; the ark 
on which the glory shone has mouldered into 
dust ; the overshadowing cherubim that were 
over the mercy-seat are utterly decayed; Aaron's 
rod, that for many years miraculously budded, 
is now unprolific dust scattered to the winds ; 



360 THE INHERITANCE. 

the sublime temple of Jerusalem, the residence 
of a present God — the palace of the great King 
— had not one stone left standing upon another 
that has not been cast down ; great cities have 
passed away like a vision, — Palmyra, Babylon 
with its walls, Thebes with its hundred gates, 
Egypt with its ancient greatness, Nineveh with 
its glory, all corruptible in their nature, are now 
corrupted, and scarce a wreck of them remains ; 
our corn grows, our vines wave, our feet tread 
upon the debris of fallen nations upon the wreck 
and mouldering dust of the boasted magnifi- 
cence of ancient days : but this inheritance is 
not corruptible, there is no taint of corruption 
in it ; it is pure, holy, perfect as the God that 
created it. It is also called f undefiled." It 
is undefiled ; there is no sin in or on it. The 
breath of sin has blighted the loveliest things 
that are upon the earth, and the trail of the 
serpent may be traced amid the most fragrant 
and beautiful flowers ; but this inheritance is 
undefiled. The best titles that are possessed by 
the princes of this world, when traced back a 
few hundred years, are found to have been se- 
cured by the sword before they were perpetuated 
by the pen ; but this inheritance has never been 



THE INHERITANCE. 361 

the arena of force, and it will never be the scene 
or subject of fraud; it is an inheritance into 
which nothing that is denied ever hath entered; 
and therefore it is added, " it fadeth not away;" 
literally, it is amaranthine, it has everlasting 
spring, it bears a perpetual bloom ; no sere leaf 
nor autumn tint is there — there is not a single 
sign or token of decay : it is the only thing 
prepared as a home for God's people that does 
not fade away. " Our fathers, where are they ? 
and the prophets, do they live for ever?" " The 
heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and 
the elements shall melt with fervent heat;" but 
that bright, that holy, that happy spot provided 
for your home and my home is undeiiled, it 
fadeth not away; it is reserved, says the Apostle, 
in heaven. It is too beautiful for the eyes of 
unsanctified man to behold ; it would be too 
tempting to Satan, like Paradise of old, if it 
were now manifested on the earth — it is kept in 
some quiet and sunny nook in the mighty 
universe of God, far above all assault or taint, 
contamination or decay ; and it will be found, 
I doubt not, when we enter, far above all that 
eye has seen, or ear has heard, or the heart of 
man has conceived. 



362 THE INHERITANCE. 

One other feature of it I notice, and it is 
the feature our bleesed Lord gives. He says, 
" Come, ye blessed of my Father • inherit the 
kingdom prepared for you:" there is only a 
variety of expression ; it is the same inheritance 
— " the kingdom prepared for you from the 
foundation of the world." In other words, this 
inheritance is a .place prepared for the people of 
God ; it is evidence of the love of Jesus, that 
he came from the throne of glory, bore our 
aches and pains, and sins and sorrows, redeemed 
us by his blood, and bequeathed us his right- 
eousness to justify us; but it is no less an 
evidence of his love that he spends the day that 
now rushes by, not in receiving the acclamations 
of adoring angels, but in preparing a place for 
the people of God. " I go," says the Saviour, 
" to prepare a place for you." It is a touching 
proof of the greatness of his love that he died 
for us; it is scarcely less so that he does nothing 
but live for us. Thus, the more we study the 
love of Christ, the more clearly we form a con- 
ception of the justice of that language which 
declares that in height, in depth, in length, and 
in breadth, it passeth all understanding. 

This inheritance, in the next place, which I 



THE INHERITANCE. 363 

have described as being prepared in heaven and 
reserved for the people of God, is described as 
an " inheritance in light." We are here not in 
the darkness of the lost, nor are we in the noon- 
day of heaven. We occupy that intermediate 
twilight which is a mixture of light and shadow 
—onward and upward to the end : but in this 
inheritance into which we hope to enter, all 
shadows shall flit away and disappear for ever; 
all seeming discrepancies that are now detected 
in the Scriptures shall be cleared up and har- 
monised ; all doubts and fears and forebodings 
shall be exiles from it for ever ; prophecy that 
now lies in the mystery of twilight, all but 
inscrutable to us, shall then be seen in noon- 
day splendour, — having unbosomed itself into 
blessed and everlasting performance ; mysteries 
that are impenetrable now shall then be lumi- 
nous. Whatever the telescope detects in the 
heights; whatever the microscope discovers in 
the depths ; whatever is too vast for our com- 
prehension; whatever is too minute for our 
inspection; shall then lie in the broad intense 
light in which there is no shadow, and we shall 
see face to face, and no more through a glass 
darkly. 



364 THE INHERITANCE. 

Having thus looked at the inheritance, let us 
study the qualification required in those who 
are to enter it. First, they are called saints. 
I do not know a word in the Bible that has 
occasioned more dispute, or that has been the 
cause of more misapprehension than that same 
word saint. If we ask a member of the Church 
of Rome, he will tell us the saints are those 
whose cases were investigated by the Pope fifty 
years after they were dead, and of whom it was 
proved that they wrought miracles, underwent 
enormous self-torture, were first beatified by the 
bishop of the diocese, and ultimately canonised, 
and enrolled in the sacred calendar by the Pope 
himself. If you ask those who are in the 
twilight between Protestant truth and Papal 
error, they will tell you that the saints are 
those distinguished men who have rendered 
great services to the church, and by consent 
of the church universal have been enrolled in 
the number of the blessed. If you ask many a 
worldly man what a saint is, he will tell you it 
means a fanatic, an enthusiast, or some great 
pretender ; but if you ask that Book which 
settles all controversy, and puts great preten- 
sions into little bulk, and speaks plainly where 



THE INHERITANCE. 365 

man thinks so obscurely, it will be found that a 
saint is not one canonised by popes, or to whose 
name the word saint is prefixed as a sort of aris- 
tocratic title, indicating a lordly position in the 
realms of glory ; that saints are not those whose 
saintship, even when analysed with the greatest 
charity, is extremely apocryphal ; but those 
that are so, not by worldly titles, not by human 
nomenclature, but by a Divine creation, the 
regeneration of the Spirit of God ; and that 
these saints are not confined to a sect, nor are 
their bright names the monopoly of a narrow 
creed and of a narrow heart; but are in every 
church and sect, and denomination of the 
church universal. They are composed, not of 
Episcopalians, Presbyterians, or Independents ; 
but of those who have washed their robes, and 
made them white in the blood of the Lamb, and 
follow Him on earth, or serve him day and night 
in glory. In other words, each person who reads 
this page is either a saint or an unconverted, 
unredeemed, unsanctified sinner. There is no 
medium between a saint — heir of the inherit- 
ance — and the sinner who is without God, and 
without a well-founded hope in the world. 
Hence every Epistle begins " To the Saints at 



366 THE INHERITANCE. 

Philippic that is, to the Christians. The literal 
translation of the word is " the holy ones/' holy 
persons, holy by renewal of heart, holy in life 
and walk. 

These saints, thus denned, are declared to be 
"partakers of the inheritance of the saints in 
light.-" This is a blessed fact. As the saintship 
that is here described is not the monopoly of 
any party, so that blessed heaven, that glorious 
inheritance to which we are moving, is not the 
monopoly of a few, it is not the narrow country 
that is fitted for the narrow-minded members 
of a narrow sect. It is that bright land, of the 
inhabitants of which it is declared in the Apoca- 
lypse, there "is a great multitude, whom no 
man could number." I think nobody can doubt 
that reads the Scriptures as a whole, that the 
result of this dispensation will be, that the vast 
majority of the human family will be saved. I 
indulge the hope, and I indulge it on the basis 
of God's Holy Word, that heaven will not have 
a little company, but a great multitude whom 
no man can number; the song of the blessed 
will not be a solo ; the future rest of the people 
of God will not be a solitude ; our joys will not 
be the less intense that they are reciprocated by 



THE INHERITANCE. 367 

many, and our songs will not be the less musical 
that they shall be the combined harmony of 
many voices : and so the harmony of the song 
and the grandeur of the scene will be augmented 
a thousand-fold, by the multitude of them that 
share in the splendour of the one, and echo the 
notes of the other. 

The inheritance of the saints in light is the 
bright prospect. The question of deepest im- 
portance to me is — ' ' Am I an inheritor of it ? 
— am I a saint V 3 This leads me, therefore, to 
notice the feature here described, which is of 
very great importance, — namely, that they are 
" meet," or fit, or adapted to, " Who hath made 
us meet ; 33 persons between whom and the 
inheritance there is some harmony or adapta- 
tion. Now, we are sometimes so prone to rest 
upon the doctrine of our justification before 
God (and we cannot rest too strongly upon it) 
that we merge or give a too subordinate place 
to the sister doctrine of fitness for the kingdom 
of heaven. There are two things requisite in 
every man that will enter heaven, and these 
are, that he shall have a title which is nothing 
in him, nothing done by him, nothing suffered 
by him, nothing paid by him, but the finished 



368 THE INHERITANCE. 

righteousness, the perfect sacrifice of the Sou 
of God in our room and stead ; and next, as we 
shall see from the nature of the case, a fitness 
for heaven, without which the title would be of 
no use to him that has it. If, therefore, we 
thank God that He has made us accepted in 
the Beloved, we shall also be taught, if we com- 
prehend the doctrine I am trying to explain 
aright, to thank God that He has, in addition 
to this, made us meet or fit for the inheritance 
of the saints in light. We see this doctrine 
taught, or if not taught, at least indicated, and 
inferred by some of the commonest analogies of 
the world. We find throughout the whole of 
God's created world every creature, it matters 
not what it be, fitted for the place it is to oc- 
cupy, or the sphere in which it is to live and 
move and gather its food. The bird, for instance, 
und r the survey of the most superficial anato- 
mist, proves itself fitted for the air; the fish 
needs but a casual inspection to show that it is 
adapted to swim in the river or in the sea ; the 
ox and the horse show that they are grami- 
nivorous, and made to browse upon the grass 
of our hills and valleys ; and man proves by his 
structure that he is made for all climes, and all 



THE INHERITANCE. 369 

countries, and all circumstances, having powers 
of adaptation in this world much greater and 
more flexible than those of any other animal, 
indicating by his physical organisation the 
power, grandeur, and original dignity of his 
nature. But man, with his present physical 
organisation, as anybody knows who is ac- 
quainted with the elements of astronomy, could 
not live in another planet. If, with his present 
apparatus of senses, he were to be transported 
to Jupiter, or to Venus, or to Saturn, or Mer- 
cury, he could live upon any of these ; for in 
the one the atmosphere would be too dense, and 
in the other attraction too powerful : so that it 
would be impossible for an inhabitant of this 
planet to live, breathe, or exist in any other 
planet in the whole universe of God. We see, 
then, in these simple facts, evidence plain 
enough that adaptation to the place the creature 
is to fill is the great law of universal existence; 
and if it be true that we are by nature unfit for 
the kingdom of heaven — that we are by nature 
dead, lost, sinful, at enmity, as unwilling to go 
near God as Ave are unfit to approach God — 
then what is that text — " Except a man be born 
again, he cannot see the kingdom of God," but 

B B 



370 THE INHERITANCE. 

the announcement of the fact that the future 
inhabitant of heaven must be made fit for the 
inheritance he is to enter on, or the destiny he 
is to occupy ? Oh ! if we felt that that heaven 
is an infinitely holy place, that man must be 
in heart, and nature, and sympathy, made meet 
to enter it, the unscriptural dogma of Baptismal 
llegeneration would not be dreamed of, or so- 
berly discussed by learned prelates and great 
theologians ; for to suppose that the sprinkling 
of water on the brow can make a man dead in 
sins fit for the realm of happiness, and light, 
and glory, and blessedness, is the grossest mis- 
conception of what Christianity is, and the 
grossest delusion about what man is, and the 
most dangerous, too, that can be palmed upon 
mankind. Let us take a step here, and you 
will see that the whole education of the child 
on earth at this moment is the apprenticeship, 
if I may so speak, of that child, in order that he 
may occupy and duly fill the sphere he is to 
have in this life. Let it be a profession for 
which the youth is trained, or let it be a trade 
to which he serves his apprenticeship, the idea 
is impressed upon him by the very nature of 
his position, that if he spend his time in idle- 



THE INHERITANCE. 371 

ness he will not excel, or probably be admitted 
into that profession ; if he spend his time in 
other pursuits, he will not be able to take his 
place as a tradesman in that trade. It is the 
great law of the condition under which we are 
placed, that men must be fitted for the navy 
who are to guide our ships to victory — others 
for the army who are to command our victorious 
troops, and carry the roll of England's conquer- 
ing drums to the utmost ends of the world. 
Man must be educated in the knowledge and 
use of the medicine that he is to prescribe with 
success ; and for law who is to argue and gain 
the victory ; and for the ministry who is to 
bring forth things new and old, and make him- 
self useful to the minds and hearts of the people 
committed to his charge. Just in the same 
manner, and by the application of the same 
analogy, we must be made meet or fit for 
the kingdom of heaven here upon earth, or 
we never can cherish the idea of entering it 
hereafter at all. 

Lose, then, the opportunity that now passes, 
and you lose the inheritance, it may be for ever. 
Fritter away in idle frivolities the precious hours 
that sweep .past with the speed of the lightning 

b b 2 



372 THE INHERITANCE. 

beam, and you miss the tide that carries you to 
heaven ; you lose the opportunity when you 
might have been accepted, and you live here- 
after, not the heir of the inheritance, but a 
hopeless and unhappy sufferer. 

Entering into heaven is not a leap, it is not 
the result of a projectile force that flings you 
from the place you love into a place that you 
know nothing about. Entrance into heaven is 
the result of a process, the end of a career 
that begins in time and culminates in glory — 
the coronal around the brow of him who has 
striven and obtained the mastery. Nay, more, 
we pass through heaven in order to go to 
heaven ; we must pass through hell in order to 
get to hell; the gates of Paradise and the pit 
of perdition open from every man's hut, and 
from every man's home. He that carries not in 
his heart the bud of heaven, shall never see the 
full blossom; he that has not now an augury 
and a foretaste of the realms of glory, never, as 
far as his present position indicates his future 
destiny, can expect to be admitted into that 
state into which only those who are meet and 
fit are admitted in the fulness of the times. 
Never, then, let us forget this, that the instant 






THE INHERITANCE. 373 

we are born we commence the descent down- 
ward and downward ; and the instant we are 
born again, the current is reversed, the tide is 
changed, and we begin the npward ascent, from 
grace to grace, till we appear before God in 
glory. 

We must have some knowledge of heaven, 
some experience of its light, and its life, and its 
happiness, and its joy here, if ever v/e are to 
expect to enter it, and enjoy it fully hereafter. 
Let us, then, examine ourselves. Are we the 
sons of God ? Have we any taste for heaven ? 
What would be the use of taking a peasant 
from the plough upon the hill- side, and intro- 
ducing that peasant into the loftiest circles of 
the cultivated and the great? He would be 
most unhappy; he would be far happier in his 
own cottage; but this is but a small thing with 
which to compare great things. Were it pos- 
sible that an unsanctified, unconverted man, 
who thinks of nothing but money, or politics, 
or of trade, and of retiring with a fortune, and 
who, in short, toils and drudges from morning 
till night with one consuming and absorbing 
aim — either to be rich or great, to be lifted by 
some mighty force into this inheritance, he 



374? THE INHERITANCE. 

could not breathe its air, nor gaze at its splen- 
dour; his heart would not beat under its at- 
mosphere, he could not exist in its society. It 
would be so intolerable a curse to him that he 
would prefer to go to his own place, for his 
torment would only be aggravated by the con- 
trast with the glory, the beauty, the perfection 
of those amid whom he would be accidentally 
cast. -^ 

Thus T have triad to show what this meet- 
ness for the kingdom of heaven is \ and to 
impress on you, my reader, and on myself, not 
separating myself from you, that unless this 
great change pass on us, we cannot enter into 
the kingdom of heaven. "We all know, that 
more of happiness is within than without. 
Take a Christian who knows that the everlast- 
ing God is his Father ; who knows this one 
truth that Paul has taught, in the 8th chapter 
of the Epistle to the Romans, that nothing 
" shall be able to separate us from the love of 
God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord;" 
plunge that saint in the very depths of hell, 
and he will have a little sweet and sun-lit 
heaven in his own bosom, that will neutralise 
all the elements and curse around him. In 



THE INHERITANCE. 375 

every case in this life, even, we know that hap- 
piness does not spring from the acres that are 
around us — the great and ceiled rooms that we 
occupy — but from within. A sanctified peasant 
in a cottage, and with a small potato-field, is a 
happy man. A coroneted noble, with his patri- 
monial acres, that he cannot count or measure, 
and all the ministry of servants, faithful and 
attached, without the peace of God in his con- 
science, is a poor and unhappy man. It is 
within that heaven :s; and if it be not created 
within, nothing can reflect it upon us with any 
effect from without. If one is in bad health, 
we know that everything about him seems to 
get the tinge of his illness and to mar enjoy- 
ment ; but if one be in good health, why, a 
brown common looks glorious, and the very 
desert seems to him to blossom like the rose. 
Let a man in good health, and with a happy 
spirit, look out upon nature, and all nature 
waves with his smiles, reflects his joy, and 
shows everything bright and beautiful, because 
the man who looks upon it is so. But let an 
unhappy man look upon Paradise itself, and 
upon all the grandeur of the widest and the 
noblest panorama, and he will hear his own 



376 THE INHERITANCE. 

sighs in the singing of the birds, and his own 
groans in the chimes of streams ; and he will 
feel reflected back npon him, and rushing per- 
petually unto him, his own sad melancholy, 
from all created things that the eye rests upon. 
Heaven must be within before we can evei 
taste or enter into heaven without. To be born 
is the commencement of our downward career ; 
to be born again, as I have told you, is the 
commencement of our upward and our best 
career. You have an illustration of this — to 
illustrate again a great thing by a small one — ■ 
in the butterfly ; and if the aged do not receive 
any instruction from the symbol, the young 
may. The butterfly is born, if I may use the 
expression, a caterpillar — an unsightly, grovel- 
ling earth-worm, fitted to crawl upon the earth, 
but never, apparently, to rise off it, or go be- 
yond it ; but by and by that butterfly is born 
again, a beautiful thing, with golden wings, 
that floats in the air, and sparkles with beauty 
and splendour in perpetual sunshine. Now, 
here you have man's earthly state, fitted for the 
earth, and to grovel on the earth. He under- 
goes a change, of which the change in that 
butterfly is but a dim and shadowy type, till he 



THE INHERITANCE. 377 

is fitted to ascend and soar, until he seats him- 
self and sings with the cherubim beside the 
throne of God. Each of us is now in the first 
state by nature ; each may be in the second 
state by grace. 

This leads me now to notice the author of 
the great change necessary to fit us for the 
kingdom of heaven — " giving thanks to the 
Father, who hath made us meet." Throughout 
the Scripture, the triune God is represented as 
having distinct offices : — God the Father is 
electing love; God the Son, redeeming love; 
and God the Spirit, sanctifying and effective 
love ; yet Jude says, " Sanctified by God the 
Father." Perhaps the idea is this, that the 
instant a Christian is born again, he is fit for 
the kingdom of heaven ; but if there be different 
places, and different dignities, and different 
degrees of glory and of happiness in the future, 
as I believe there are, then he that has made 
greatest progress in conformity to Christ will 
occupy the loftiest place in that inheritance 
that remains for the people of God. The mo- 
ment that a child is born, it is fit to live in 
this world ; but the man who has attained full 
manhood is far more fitted to live in it, as he 



378 THE INHERITANCE. 

comes into it with more manifold relations, 
and is able for the discharge of duties of which, 
of course, the babe is utterly incapable. In 
like manner, the moment that a man is really 
converted, really renewed by the Spirit of God, 
he is then, if he were to die, fit for the kingdom 
of heaven ; but if he be spared, he grows in 
grace, develops new features, makes progress 
in conformity to Christ, until he is called to 
exchange grace for glory, and time for an end- 
less eternity. 

None, I believe, are ever perfectly holy in 
this life. There is no man who is not neces- 
sitated to say, at the last pulse that his heart 
beats, as well as at the first : — " If we say we 
have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth 
is not in us ; but if we confess our sins, God 
is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and 
to cleanse us from all unrighteousness." For 
instance, men were saved by Christ before 
Christ's work was completed on the cross. 
And may it not be true, that w r e shall be pro- 
nounced fit for heaven by His Spirit, before the 
Spirit's work in us is perfectly completed ? In 
the faith that Christ would complete His work, 
sinners of old were saved; and so in the faith 



THE INHERITANCE. 379 

that the Spirit will perfect that which con- 
cerneth us, and make us perfectly holy, that 
we may be perfectly happy, we shall be made 
meet here for an entrance into the kingdom of 
heaven. 

If Christ is gone to prepare a place for ns in 
the kingdom of heaven, He takes time to do so. 
The Spirit of God is come down to prepare us 
for the kingdom of heaven, and he takes time 
to do so too; and the Spirit of God will no 
more leave off His work of fitting His people 
for heaven, than the Saviour would have left off 
His work before He finished all that the Father 
had given Him to do. Our souls in our bodies 
are now undergoing that process of perfection 
which our bodies soon shall undergo in the 
grave, in order to fit the resuscitated body, 
in all its resurrection glory, for the sanctified 
and holy soul in all its heavenly and divine 
beauty. 

Thus, God the Father fits us, by His Spirit, 
for the inheritance of the saints in light. Let 
me put this meetness before the reader, in two 
or three plain, practical questions. What are 
evidences of fitness for the kingdom of heaven ? 
Not the least is love to the Bible, and delight in 



380 THE INHERITANCE. 

it. The man is a fool that speaks disrespectfully 
of the Bible ; surely he never read it who talks 
of it as inferior in grandeur, in literary beauty 
and excellence, to any of the productions of 
man : and he has never felt his want of a 
Saviour, or the effects of the truths of the 
gospel, who does not appreciate and love that 
blessed book. It is the map of the inheritance 
■ — it is the road-book to heaven; and if our 
hearts, and our treasure, and our hopes, and our 
prospects, are there, we shall not fail to study 
the map, we shall often refer to the road-book, 
lest we miss the way and lose the boon to which 
we are travelling. 

If we are at all meetening for this inheri- 
tance, we shall love the house of God. \Ye 
shall love the house of God, not for its archi- 
tectural beauty, not for the eloquence of the 
preacher, not because of the elegancy of the 
forms, but because our minds are enlightened 
by the preacher, God's word is there made 
plainer to us, deep impressions are struck upon 
our hearts, and bright hopes are kindled in our 
souls, and God meets us there, and makes us 
say from happy hearts, " It was good for us to 
be there."" If we are preparing, then, and 



THE INHERITANCE. 381 

ripening for that kingdom, we shall love the 
house of God : if we are being made meet for 
that inheritance, we shall also sympathise with 
the cause and with the kingdom of Christ. Our 
whole thoughts will not be about literature or 
science, our whole mind will not be absorbed by 
the cares, the toils, the anxieties of the world. 
"We are made, of course, to be in the world, to 
take our place in its duties, and never to 
shrink from them : but we are made also in the 
world to have in our hearts the spot of sunshine 
that connects us and ties us to another, a better 
and a happier world. 

If, then, we are the people of God, and being 
made meet for that blessed state, we shall be 
anxious to hear of Missionary success, we shall 
rejoice to learn that the cause and the kingdom 
of Christ are prospering ; we shall weep when 
Christians weep, and rejoice when Christians 
rejoice, and look upon the spread of pure, 
undefiled religion, as God's greatest blessing- 
bestowed upon mankind. 

We shall also love the Sabbath. The rest 
which remaineth for the people of God is, 
literally translated, (SajSjSuncrjuoc,) a Sabbath- 
keeping for the people of God. If I address 



382 THE INHERITANCE. 

any one anticipating a Mahometan elysium, or 
a Pagan heaven, he may be assured he is 
utterly mistaken. What we shall have in the 
future inheritance is an everlasting, a ceaseless 
Sabbath — Sabbath-keeping, worship, commu- 
nion, fellowship, life, light, ioy, happiness. 

Do you love the Sabbath upon earth? do you 
hail the dawn of the Sabbath as the day on 
which you cast off Mammon's chains, and shut 
your ears to the din aud roaring of the wheels 
of this terrible and intensely commercial world ? 
that enables you to open your heart to better 
thoughts, and your eyes to a brighter vision, 
and your ears to strains divine — the tidings of 
an inheritance, incorruptible, undefiled, and that 
fadeth not away? 

Finally, if we are looking for this inheritance, 
and are prepared to enter it, we shall give thanks 
to the Father, who hath made us meet. We 
made ourselves unfit ; God alone can make us 
fit. God the Creator made us ; It is God the 
Father that re-makes us. By the first act we 
were made creatures ; by the second act we are 
made new creatures, sons of God, and heirs of 
Christ. And if we have hearts thus ripening 
for the rest that comes — if we have souls thus 



THE INHERITANCE. 383 

being made meet by the presence of heaven for 
the full enjoyment of heaven, then we shall not 
only be holier men, but, what those who do 
not know Christianity suspect and question, far 
happier men. There will then be a joy spread 
over our spirit as we walk with God, who is 
the fount of joy ; we shall be raised above the 
region of storms, and placed amid the sunshine 
of the blessed ; we shall meet death, when death 
comes, heroically. There is not one face that 
gazes on this page that within a few years shall 
not be cold and mouldering in the tomb; and 
there is not one body in this generation in 
which there is not a soul that shall live for ever 
in eternal joy, or writhe for ever in misery it 
has prepared for itself. What a thought ! What 
earnestness, what anxiety, what inquiry should 
such thoughts create within us ! And yet, how 
little do we think of this ! how little do we feel 
this! If we felt aright, would it make us 
miserable ? No. If I am fit for the inheritance, 
then I meet death, not as the suspension of the 
continuity of my life, but as the consecrated 
messenger of Heaven that cuts the cords that 
bind me to mortality, and helps me, like the 
insect I have referred to, to unfurl new and 



384 THE INHERITANCE. 

glorious wings, and to rise and soar, until I am 
placed beyond the shadows and the sorrows of 
mortality and of time. 

And now, my dear reader, let me ask you 
agrin as I close, Have you any reason to believe 
that you are going to heaven ? It is a plain 
question ; answer it plainly ; answer it for your- 
self as in the sight of God. Every swing of the 
pendulum carries every moment a soul to eter- 
nity. If we had eyes to see what is noAV invi- 
sible, and ears to hear what is now inaudible, 
we should see the whole atmosphere that Ave 
breathe loaded with immortal souls, rushing 
from their wrecked bodies to the presence of 
God ; and we shall hear constantly the crash of 
the archangel's trumpet as they were gathered 
to the seat of doom, to receive their everlasting 
sentence. The stumbling of his horse, the 
other year, let loose from its tenement of clay 
the most celebrated and accomplished states- 
man of the age. Our life is a shadow. Its 
continuance has no guarantee for a single day : 
the soul is ever ready to escape. The youngest 
does not know that he may not be summoned 
the next minute ; and with respect to the aged 
of sixty, seventy, eighty, my dear brother, my 



THE INHERITANCE. 385 

dear father, every beat of your heart is. the 
curfew-bell that tells you that the day is clos- 
ing, and the night is coming, when all the fires 
of human passion should be quenched, and you 
should compose your souls for the rest of the 
people of God. 



o c 



CHAPTER XIV. 

SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 

" It is a season for the quiet thought 
And the still reckoning -with thyself. The year 
Gives back the spirits of its dead, and time 
Whispers the history of its vanish'd hours, 
And the heart, calling its affections up, 
Counteth its wasted ingots. Life stands still, 
And settles like a fountain, and the eye 
Sees clearly through its depths, and noteth all 
That stirr'd its troubled waters." 

" The harvest is past, the summer is ended, and we are 
not saved." — Jer. viii. 20. 

Perhaps the words of the prophet standing 
at the head of this chapter, may have reference 
to a merely temporal deliverance. Neverthe- 
less, they may be fairly applied, as in all 
probability they also actually refer, to a 
spiritual and an eternal salvation. The words 
embody the deep expression of agony which is 
often felt by those who have seen successive 



SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 387 

opportunities of spiritual improvement spent 
and mis-spent • or lingering for a season beside 
them, and afterwards discover, when too late, 
their souls unblest, their controversy with God 
unsettled, and their everlasting prospects dark 
and ominous. In such circumstances, the pro- 
phet hears some one exclaim — "The harvest, 
when the corn might be gathered in — the 
summer, when the earth might have been ex- 
pected to wave with promise, are past ; and the 
great end for which still shine the summer suns, 
and wave the golden fruits of autumn — the 
safety of our souls — our fitness for appearing 
before God — is as much in the background as 
at any previous period of our life." The words 
I have quoted are a commentary upon " too 
late." "Too late" cannot be said at the close 
of last year, but many may have to utter it at 
the close of life — more to utter it in no less 
bitter agony at the close of this dispensation, 
when it may be "too late" to pray — "too late" 
to repent — " too late" for heaven, and only not 
too late for eternal and irreparable exile from 
the joy and the presence of the Lord. There 
are but two great results of this life which are of 
real, permanent, and solemn importance — these 

c c 2 



388 SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 

are "saved" or "unsaved." "Saved" or "not 
saved" is true of every man. Whatever else, 
reader, you may be, or in whatever circum- 
stances you may be placed, you too this moment 
are a saved man, or not saved at all. In other 
words, you are at this very moment either a 
a son of God and an heir of glory, or a child 
of the world and an heir — a deserving heir — 
of everlasting misery. One or other each of us 
is. Life is the most solemn position in which 
man can be placed. There is no such thing as 
an intermediate position of being neither saved 
nor lost. There is no intermediate character 
between one who is altogether a Christian, or 
not a Christian at all. This is a very solemn 
thought ; it is a thought that should make me 
and you think : it ought to provoke in the 
depth of every man's soul the question — Is 
Christianity anything to me? am I interested 
in Christianity? Has the gospel touched and 
transformed me by its power ? or has it left me 
just where sin and Satan and the world left me? 
" saved or unsaved," whether interesting to us 
or not, interests the inhabitants of both worlds. 
Patriarchs, prophets, apostles, evangelists, write 
of this as the burden of their inspiration ; the 



SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 389 

angels in glory are interested in the conflict, for 
there is joy with them over one sinner saved. 
The fiends in hell are interested in the conflict, 
for they "go about seeking whom they may 
devour." " Saved or unsaved/' should be the 
substance of our retrospect of the past — it 
should be the substance of our prospect for the 
future. No result can be compared to salvation. 
Some have become rich, others poor, in the 
past year. Some have felt disease, others have 
escaped it unscathed. These are not unimport- 
ant results; these are reasons for submission 
or thankfulness to God : but all these put 
together are not to be compared for one moment 
with that ultimate result which absorbs all and 
supersedes all, and in weight and magnificence 
eclipses all. "Am I saved — a Christian? or 
am I not saved, and not a Christian ? n It is 
salvation that gives importance to days, to 
months, to years. It is the chiefest of the 
Voices of the Night. It is that for which we 
are here spared ; it is the explanation of our 
protracted life — of our deliverance from disease 
— of our health and strength. 

There are seasons constantly occurring in this 
world which are fitted for attaining great and 



390 SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 

good temporal results, and which, if allowed to 
pass away unseized and unimproved, cannot be 
recalled. We cannot complain that this is so 
arranged in the special case of the safety of the 
soul. It is the law that runs through the whole 
universe, and gives consistency and unity to all 
the operations of Deity. Are you about to learn 
a trade ? there is an apprenticeship required, 
during which you must master all its details, 
and become acquainted with all its processes. 
Idle away the period of apprenticeship, and at 
the end of it you have not learned your trade. 
The harvest, in such a case, is past, the summer 
is ended, and the trade is not learned. If a 
profession is to be learned — let that profession 
be law or medicine — the army or the navy — 
there is preparation required — hard, painstaking 
study and attention : neglect this, and you are 
utterly unfitted and unprepared for your profes- 
sion. So in the great battle of life which every 
man has to fight ; there are crises which decide 
the issues of eternity. At the battle of Waterloo 
there was a crisis in the tactics and arrange- 
ments of the field, which the eagle eye of the 
great British commander saw, and which made 
him exclaim, " This will do ! " — simple, but 



SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 391 

significant words. If lie had lost that moment 
— if he had not seized it the instant it was at 
his feet — the battle had been lost — the destiny 
of England had been changed, and the fate of 
Europe had been otherwise also. There are 
moments in the battle of life that rush past us, 
pregnant with vast results, which seized, may 
be the turning-points of our everlasting safety; 
whereas, if we let them go, the harvest will be 
past, the summer will be ended, and we shall 
not be saved. 

There is a season every man knows, called 
spring, when we must sow ; if we do not sow in 
spring, there will be no bud in the summer, nor 
blossom in autumn, nor precious fruit gathered 
in for the winter. No one complains of this 
law ; nor can any one deny it. It is a law that 
develops itself in the narrowest plot of ground 
that is attached to the humblest cottage, that if 
there be no sowing in spring — no cultivation 
of the soil — or laborious attention on the part 
of the husbandman, there will be no summer 
blossom, and no autumn fruit. Nobody com- 
plains of this law — we accept it as one of the 
fixed ordinances of Heaven; and if we have 
not learned lessons from it, the blame is 



392 SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 

not due to the great Creator, but wholly to 
us. 

I have thus indicated analogies illustrative 
of the subject under review — analogies plain, 
decided, invariable, and significant of corres- 
ponding moral laws. Let, for instance, the 
apprenticeship be spent in idleness, and the 
trade is not learned. Let the midshipman drink, 
smoke, read the newspapers — let the young 
soldier study dress, read novels, and neglect 
his profession — and the one will never be a 
seaman creditable to his country, and the other 
will never be a soldier likely to prove an acces- 
sion to the service. If we neglect the advan- 
tage that now presents itself for bettering our 
circumstances in life, another advantage may 
occur ; but the one we have lost never can 
recur, and no subsequent opportunity may be 
equal to our requirement. The tide is lost; 
the train is gone ; you are too late ; the sum- 
mer is ended, the harvest is past, and all is 
irrecoverable. In a higher sense these truths 
are applicable. There are seasons peculiarly 
appropriate for thinking, and for thinking with 
effect, about God — the soul — eternity. There 
are occasions in the lapse of years, in the ex- 



SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 393 

perience of life, so precious, that upon them, as 
upon fulcra, depend the issues of heaven and 
hell. There are moments in our experience as 
immortal beings, which, if lost, are lost for ever, 
and we with them. There is nothing that we 
need to learn or to feel more profoundly than 
this, that whenever an opportunity occurs, be 
it what it may, of receiving a new truth, of 
drinking in a deeper and a more solemn im- 
pression, we ought not to let it pass unimproved 
or unsanctifiefl, but to grasp it, to pray over it, 
that it may be consecrated to the glory of God, 
and to the good of our souls. Let me specify 
some of these occasions. I have mentioned the 
period given us for preparing for a profession — 
apprenticeship given us for preparing for a trade, 
and seed-time our preparation for the autumn. 
Let us now look at the periods in our life when 
such preparation may be made as will enable 
us to exclaim, The summer has come to an end, 
the harvest is past, and we feel, and feel with 
joy and reverence^ that we are saved ! 

The first period I wiJl specify is the delight- 
ful and the susceptible season of youth. All 
Scripture is eloquent with observations upon 
the advantages of early pietv — of religion re- 



394 SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 

ceived, felt, and practised in that spring-time. 
Youth is highly sensitive and receptive. Im- 
pressions that are made upon the young not 
only strike the deepest, but in every instance 
they last the longest; so that the aged man 
recollects the lessons of his youth when he 
has forgotten those of his maturer manhood. 
The first thought of love or of hate that is im- 
bibed by a child, casts a bright light or a dark 
shadow over all the future of his pilgrimage 
upon earth. Whatever is learned and felt when 
we are young is learned most thoroughly and 
felt most deeply, and is spread far into our 
years, and rarely fails to give a strong colouring 
and shape to much of our future life. Now, if 
the season of youth, from seven to twenty, pass 
by without receiving, deep, sacred, Christian 
impressions, I do not say that no other season 
will occur in which you may believe, and be- 
lieving live for ever, but I do say, that such a 
season as that you have lost will never come 
round again; at no period will your heart be 
so open — your power of receiving truth so in- 
tense ; at no after age will the heart be capabl * 
of receiving so deep and thorough an impres- 
sion. The cares, the anxieties, and the troub!es 



SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 395 

of this life, will too soon tread down the softest 
sensibilities of the heart, till it becomes almost 
case-hardened to everything bnt the calls of 
Mammon and the impressions of the world 
around you. But in the season of youth all is 
bright before us, all is hopeful within us, and 
the whole heart accessible and open. The sha- 
dows of the mind are very much like those of 
the body. In the morning of life the shadows 
are behind us, in the noon of life we trample 
them under foot, in the evening of life they 
stretch, long, broad, and deep, into eternity 
before us. Let pass away the bright season of 
youth, and the probabilities are diminished, to 
use the language of this world, of your receiv- 
ing saving impressions. You have lost an op- 
portunity that will never recur. You are less 
likely now to feel as you would have felt in 
earlier days, less likely, after each instance of 
refusal or neglect, to embrace hereafter that 
gospel which sanctifies all that know t, and 
saddens none, and, if possible, adds to the 
splendours, while it detracts from the clangers 
of the rising sun of youth. 

There is a season, too, which may be called 
our summer, and that is the season when we 



396 SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 

take, as we often must do, if we are rational 
and reflective men, retrospects and reviews of 
all that is behind us ; when we look back upon 
the outs and ins and windings of lite, when the 
sense of sin saddens us, when the enjoyment of 
mercies makes us grateful, or a view of the 
vanity of all things tends to detach us from the 
world. Those times when we leave the beaten 
highway of public life, and turn aside to the 
by-ways, and nooks, and sequestered spots of 
private life, to meditate, to think, to ponder, 
are fraught with momentous effects ; these are 
moments when the thought that should be 
deepest and dearest ought to be embraced and 
held fast. Those moments of thought are the 
mothers of eternities — they are the pivots on 
which heaven and hell vibrate. As often as 
you can escape from the world, and get into 
some quiet nook, either in the country or in 
your closets, do think, not about what you have 
lost in trade yesterday, or what you shall gain 
to-morrow — but think, "as the summer suns 
are setting, and the autumn tints are coming," 
whether, whenboth are buried in ihe past, and the 
great blank of eternity is all you have got to look 
into with wistful face, you are saved or not saved. 



SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 397 

There are, too, seasons of bereavement, when 
the thought suggested by the prophet should 
come home to us. When some bitter and irre- 
parable loss breaks in upon us like an irresistible 
wave, carrying away upon its surge all that was 
fair, and beautiful, and hallowed; and when 
that surge almost sweeps away the very ground 
on which we ourselves were standing — in the 
terrible blank which such bereavement leaves 
behind it, the heart is made soft, tender, sus- 
ceptible ; and, in the agony of its desolation, it 
lifts itself above the world, and looks if there be 
any fixture above the tide-mark on which it can 
lay hold, and withstand the rush, and defy the 
force of other storms. At such a moment, all 
proud thoughts are levelled, all high imagina- 
tions are laid low. We see the tree withered 
down to the roots, and washed away, beneath 
whose beautiful shadow we sat so sweetly, and 
so securely. It is when such desolation over- 
takes us, that all that fascinates in this world 
parts with its beauty. Its palaces appear but 
clay, its favour appears but a name, its glory 
seems to be a flash upon the waters, and all its 
honour but shame. As when the floods have 
retired, the soil is made the more ready to 



398 SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 

receive the seed that will grow up into fuller 
harvests — so the heart has become subdued and 
softened after such sweeping desolation; and 
the living seed that may be cast into it will 
bud, and blossom, and bring forth, in some 
thirty, in some sixty, and in some an hundred 
fold. At such a crisis it is the duty of the 
minister, it is the privilege of the Christian, to 
point the mourner to that beauteous bow, at 
first unseen, that spans the waste of waters — 
that bow which reminds us of the word of a 
covenant-making and a promise-keeping God, 
under whose glorious arch we may go forth 
from the bleak Ararat, where the flood has left 
us, and look forth, not like Noah, upon a world 
depopulated and dismantled, but upon the 
brightening prospects and the unfading splen- 
dours of the new Jerusalem itself. Seasons of 
bereavement are seasons for deep, holy, and per- 
manent impression. Next to the season of 
youth, that of severe loss is the time when holy 
impressions may be most deeply made. Yet 
often have I noticed, in my short, and com- 
paratively limited experience, as a minister of 
the gospel, that those who have suffered severe 
bereavement, after a season of deep and religious 



SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 399 

feeling, relapse into worse than former insensi- 
bility : the world comes back ; its pleasures 
again charm, its follies again attract ; and even 
they who gave the rich promise of a new move- 
ment heavenward, and a new character and 
destiny, may be constrained to say, in the 
agony of their feelings, when death overtakes 
them — " That summer, whose sun shone with 
such promise upon us, is past; that harvest 
whose golden fruits we anticipated is gone ; and 
alas, Ave are not saved ! " 

I know that I touch a chord that will vibrate 
responsively in every reader's heart, when I say 
that there are seasons even of merriment and 
gladness, which, to Christian minds, convey 
deep, holy, and abiding impressions. Perhaps, 
reader, around your happy fireside there was 
a happy Christmas gathering, and merry faces 
shone with unusual beauty in the light of that 
yule fire; and the music of children's glad 
voices, the sweetest music of all, was softer 
than Christmas chimes; but when you looked 
around at the bright scene, and heard the merry 
voices, did you not feel rising wit,hin you a sort 
of counter -current that made you sad, even 
when all around you was so joyful ? You 



400 SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 

thought — " This picture will one day be re- 
versed ■ those heads, so fall of bright thoughts, 
will one day toss upon the fevered pillow, and 
those little hearts, now beating with glad emo- 
tions, will one day beat ' funeral marches to the 
grave ; ' and this home, that now rings with the 
merry laugh, will one day echo the sighs and 
the lamentations of them that weep over the 
lost that will no more return." Thus, burial 
thoughts mingle with the brightest bridal 
thoughts, and you are sad, you know not why; 
thus we feel occasionally sorrowful, even when 
all around is happy. Such a season, when 
these reflections are kindled within you, is pre- 
pared for deep, holy, permanent impressions — 
impressions that will lead you to reverse the 
text I have quoted so often, when you come to 
lie down and die, and to say — "The summer 
indeed is past, and the harvest indeed is ended ; 
but the truth that touched us then has been 
cherished and become developed into truth 
that sanctifies us now, and we are saved, the 
heirs of God, and the joint heirs of Jesus 
Christ." 

There is another season when impressions 
may be made that are lasting and precious; 



SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 401 

that of the expiring moments of each did year. 
That interval between the departing and the 
dawning year is a precious season ; that moment 
which is, if I may so speak, the twilight of the 
years; the evening twilight of the one, that 
blends with the morning twilight of the other, 
holds folded in its embrace great results. The 
hour at the end of which one year lays down its 
load and its life, and out of which will soon 
emerge in resurrection-beauty — fraught with its 
issues, its facts, its sorrows, its joys, the next 
untried and unknown year ; the place which is, 
as it were, the meeting of the waters of the past 
with the waters of the present ; the spot at 
which the last year lays down its burden and its 
testimony, to witness against us or for us, and 
from which the next year starts in its career, 
" rejoicing like a strong man to run its race," 
is no unimportant thing in the biography of 
man. It seems a moment for settling other 
accounts than those of our ledgers — making 
other presents than those that are usually made. 
" My son, give me thy heart," is the demand 
that is addressed, then, to every man — the bill 
left at every man's door — a responsibility which 
remains at this moment upon every soul, the 

D B 



402 SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 

ignoring of which is the refusal of our greatest- 
joy, and the heartfelt response to which is the 
commencement of a new and blessed career. It 
is a voice of the night. " The night is far spent, 
the day is at hand." I admit this epoch is not 
real in one sense, because days, and years, and 
months, and weeks, are the mere nomenclature 
of man, the stepping-stones that part and mark, 
as it were, that strong current that runs cease- 
lessly along, in which there is no division or 
distinction in the nomenclature of heaven. Still 
it is, by a just conventional arrangement, a mo- 
ment in the lapse of years when it becomes us 
to take a retrospect, and ask ourselves " What 
have the last fifty-two Sundays that I have 
spent done for me? What impressions have 
they left upon my heart? What new lessons 
have I learned ? What new accessions have I 
made to my store of knowledge? What new 
hopes have been created within me? What 
new duties have they made more acceptable, 
more easy, more delightful? What new sacri- 
fices have they prompted me to make? How 
much have I given to the cause of humanity — 
to the claims of Christ — to the progress of 
religion ? What passions have I subdued ? 



SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 403 

What evil propensities have I extirpated by 
the aid of the Spirit of God ? What evil con- 
nexions have I broken off? What bad com- 
pany have I renounced ? In short, has the past 
hardened, or has it subdued, and softened and 
sanctified me, so that I am not at its close what 
I was at its beginning, but have reason to thank 
God, that ' whereas I was once blind, now I 
see?'" Examine yourself; take an impartial 
retrospect ; do not give every moment to the 
world, to the flesh, to Satan ! but seize the fleet 
moment — grasp the rushing hours; determine 
you will not be the slaves of Satan, of Mam- 
mon, and of sin ; but that you will seize mo- 
ments in which you will think and you will 
know whether the summer that is ended, and 
the harvest that is closing, have ended the one 
and closed the other in your salvation, or the 
reverse. One wonders how men can continue in 
the world without thoughts like these. Though 
the recent epidemic that swept away its thou- 
sands has passed away, death is still mowing 
down his daily victims. We hear of those that 
were healthy at sunrise, cut down by sunset; 
and surely, if such facts are common, and 
sudden deaths are more common, I think, now 

dd2 



404 SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 

than ever they were, the universal experience 
should not, indeed, make us fear death, or be 
alarmed at the prospect of its approach ; but it 
should induce us to ask ourselves in the sight 
of God, Have I that principle within me which 
will teach me to defy death ? Am I resting 
on that blessed Saviour who will enable me to 
meet death as a friend, or to despise him as a 
foe — knowing that he lost his sting when I 
lost the burden of my transgressions, and that 
neither life nor death shall be able to separate 
me from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus 
my Lord ? We are, in this world, very much 
like a man walking just once over a land strewn 
with gems and covered with fragments of virgin 
gold, which become fewer and less precious the 
farther he advances on his journey, till, when 
he arrives at the end of it, there is none left at 
all. How sad must be the reflection of that 
man if, when he has reached the limits of the 
country he has been traversing, he shall find 
that he has gathered fading flowers — that he 
has listened to the warbling birds on the trees, 
but has neglected to pick up one piece of gold 
or gather one gem, and that the country is now 
traversed bv him for the last time, and that he 



SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 405 

cannot return to make up in the future what he 
has culpably lost. Such is our position; we 
are travelling through a land where each step 
brings us nearer to that moment when its 
opportunities will be lost for ever, when, if we 
have mis-spent our time, we shall be constrained 
to say what we cannot conceal from ourselves 
— " The harvest is past, the summer is ended, 
and we are not saved." To be saved is, as far 
as I can see, the rare thing ; to be lost for ever 
— it is a very awful statement to make — seems, 
as far as we can judge, to be the frequent thing. 
And yet, what is it to be saved? — to be made 
unspeakably happy ; really, truly, to live. What 
is it to be lost ? — it is all summed up in one 
dread utterance — "A fearful looking-for of 
judgment and fiery indignation, where the worm 
dieth not, and the fire is not quenched." 

The gay, the frivolous, the thoughtless, whose 
life has been but preparation for the world, 
who have loved to look into each man's coun- 
tenance, in order to catch the smile of approval, 
and have rarely spoken, save to hear the respon- 
sive echo of their own voices — those who have 
lived in pleasure and for pleasure — are not pre- 
paring for the harvest of the earth. In vain I 



406 SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 

have warned you of the accelerated rush of 
years, the daily disappearance of precious hours 
unimproved. You have told me that rosy June 
would never end, that sunny July would not 
close — that the soft sun of August would not 
set — and lo? there is pale November and freez- 
ing December, the winter of death at your very 
doors. The last note is sung ; the last act of 
the last drama is performed ; the curtain falls ; 
the summer is ended, the harvest is past ; the 
last pulse is trembling in your heart ; and what 
a terrible discovery as time ends — " I am not 
saved ;" And there will be at that day, too, 
many an industrious man, many a prudent man, 
who will be able to say at his death, and what 
so far one likes to hear — "I have reared a 
family in comfort : I have laboured hard from 
early morning till late at evening; I have 
realised a property ; I have made my sons to 
occupy a position greater and more dignified 
than that in which I was born ; I have received 
the applause of all that knew me, as one 
honest, respectable, all that society could de- 
mand, and I am rich, and increased with goods ; 
but I have neglected my soul and lost happi- 
ness ; the summer is ended, the harvest is past ; 



SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 407 

and though. I am many things which the world 
admires, I am not that which God demands — 
' I am not saved !'" 

And there will be at that day some that can 
say. "We never deserted the house of God — 
we never were absent from the accustomed pew ; 
nay, we never heard a sermon that touched our 
hearts, but we made purposes of amendment, 
and we liked the minister's preaching so that 
we never could be absent from our place. His 
was as the voice of one that played well upon 
an instrument ; and ever as we had a sickness, 
our sick chamber became the place where we 
made new resolutions : and ever as we had a 
loss, that loss led us to think of the uncertainty 
of temporal things. But there we halted ; and 
lo, the summer is ended — fragrant with the 
blossoms of a thousand resolutions ; the harvest 
is past, but the blossoms were nipped before 
they were developed into fruit ; and the dis- 
covery we now make, when that discovery is 
too late for reparation, is — ' We are not 
saved!'" 

Realise, if you can, that moment that lays 
low the lofty, and humbles all — a death-bed. 
Do not shrink from this duty ; try to anticipate 



408 SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 

it : it is absolutely certain, dear reader, that 
you and I must lie down and die. Are you in 
that state now in which you could wish to die ? 
If you are not, why are you not ? what is the 
reason of it ? " What shall it profit a man, if 
he gain the whole world and lose his own 
soul?" Why do you reject the gospel? Why 
not live under its influence? Why does it 
not wield a supreme, absolute, absorbing sway 
in your heart? It would make you more 
happy: it would keep you in perfect peace. 
It would give you a conscious safety amid the 
shocks and convulsions of the world ; it would 
make your brow calm, when the brows of all 
besides were overshadowed; it would make 
your heart beat joyfully when the hearts of all 
besides were fluttering with fear, because of the 
things that are coming on the earth. You have 
no idea — I have seen it, and I can testify it — ■ 
how worthless that fortune of yours will look 
upon a death bed ; you have not the least 
notion, and you will not believe me now, though 
one day you may feel it, how insignificant, 
paltry, worthless, pitiable, that money which 
you are now toiling, and drudging, and search- 
ing every part of the earth to gather, will then 



SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 409 

and there appear ! You have no conception 
now what vanity and vexation of spirit it will 
create on that day. 

Then, reader, lay up treasures in the skies ; 
start the Christian race; believe in Him who 
is the propitiation for our sins ; resolve that if 
you have lived long without religion, you will 
live so no longer ; and when you come to die, 
you will be able to look back from your sick- 
bed, and say, " I have lived, but not for myself; 
I have not made the world worse, but better ; 
I have not been a mere blank or blot, but in 
some degree, a blessing; and I can now look 
forward to a crown of glory, to a life that shall 
never end — not because of what I have done, 
but because of Him who washed me in His 
blood, and made me a king and a priest to God 
and His Father for ever." Take the things of 
the world as refreshments by the way ; regard 
eternal joy as the end of your journey, the hope 
of your hearts. 

Thus I have looked at those seasons which 
in the night prove times of deep and solemn 
thought. Do not dismiss them from your 
mind; when they overtake it, ponder them; 
hold them fast, as did the patriarch, the angel; 



410 SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 

pray that they may be consecrated to you, and 
that they may be long, deep, inextinguishable 
voices, sweet music by night — the prelude of a 
joyful day. 

Even at this hour of the far-spent night, 
and amid all its varying scenes, vicissitudes, 
and sights, and sorrows, we who still live have 
abundant reason for gratitude. 

True, there is no home or heart upon earth, 
on which clouds have not settled ; no song has 
ever been sung beside the domestic hearth, or 
around a Christmas fire, in which a melancholy 
minor has not mingled. It is good for us that 
it should be so; we could not always live in the 
sunshine ; we need cloud and shadow to soften 
and mitigate it. But whatever may have been 
the disasters that have overtaken us — whatever 
may be the character of the severe and startling 
incidents that may have happened beneath each 
roof, — yet if we compare our firesides with 
many a fireside in England — or the sad suffer- 
ings which the revelations recently made in one 
of the daily newspapers disclose, we shall neither 
be insensible to blessings, nor unthankful for 
them. Compare our home with the homes of 
the Continent of Europe, that still vibrate and 



SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 411 

rock with the remaining shocks of the earth- 
quake which began in 1848, and other shocks of 
which will soon follow, and are still clouded and 
shaded with dark and ominous prospects, and 
then let us ask ourselves if we have not abun- 
dant reason, as we review our domestic as well 
as our personal history, to say — " Bless the 
Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits ! " 

Nor is there a Christian congregation in the 
land, that has not much reason to be thankful. 
God has spared oftenest the green, and taken 
first the ripe. Death, whether to the young or 
to the aged Christian, is no calamity. It is but 
God's way of colonising heaven. 

We are here, as it were, in the mother-land. 
Those mansions that Christ has gone to prepare, 
are the colonies he desires to people. He trans- 
plants us from this cold and wintry world, to 
yon balmy, and happy, and blessed world ; and 
the children of God who are taken from us, are 
not lost — they are only gone before. It may be, 
that the distance between us and our dead in 
Christ, over whom we weep, is far less than the 
distance between us and our friends in Scotland, 
or America, or our acquaintance on the Con- 
tinent of Europe. It may be that the dead who 



412 SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 

are gone before us, are still spectators of our 
joys, witnesses of our trials, and that many a 
mother looks from her sphere of felicity and joy 
after that young man who forgets that mother's 
first lessons and forsakes that mother's beautiful 
and holy precedent, and breathes, if she does 
not utter, ' ' O Absalom, my son, my son ! O 
Absalom, my son, my son ! " If, then, you 
love that mother — if you revere that mother's 
Christian example — let me ask you who are 
young, to be followers of her, and of them who 
through faith and patience have inherited the 
promises. 

And I need not say, that as a nation we have 
much reason to be thankful. We have seen 
manifested lately much loyalty in the people, 
much generosity and liberality among the higher 
classes. Enquiries have been made into the 
condition of the poor, such as never have been 
instituted in any land. Efforts have been made 
by all parties — statesmen, politicians, religious 
men, worldly men — to mitigate and elevate the 
wretched and painful condition of the poor. All 
these are auguries and tokens of good, and they 
lead me often to hope, that when all the rest of 
the world shall be shattered by those storms 



SPENT AND MIS-SPENT. 413 

that are yet to descend upon us, God may be 
reserving this land to be the asylum of Europe, 
the sanctuary of the nations, and ambassadress 
of heaven, the benefactress of all mankind. 

And of the Church Universal, the prospects 
are not less delightful. I believe there is an 
increase of real living religion ill the midst of 
us. I believe that God is adding to His Church 
daily such as shall be saved. I believe the 
prospects of the Church of Christ, with all its 
drawbacks, and with all its failings, were never 
brighter or more pregnant with promise than 
they are at the present moment. 

Let us then, amid all our troubles, lift our 
heads in hope, and our hearts in confidence; 
and when summers shall be ended, and future 
harvests shall be passed away, let us pray, let 
us determine, by God's grace, that we shall not 
be left to say, " The harvest is passed, the 
summer is ended, and we are not saved." 



CHAPTER XV. 

NEARING SUNRISE. 

" Answer thine own Bride and Spirit ! 
Hasten, Lord, the general doom ; 
Promised glory to inherit, 
Take thy pining exiles home. 

All creation 
Travails, groans, and bids thee come." 

" For as often as ye eat this bread, and drink this cup, ye do 
show the Lord's death till he come." — 1 Cor. xi. 26. 

The Lord's Supper was instituted in the 
night -season. It is one of the Voices of the 
Night. This paper presents an aspect of the 
communion rarely dwelt on : I view it as bear- 
ing on the future, as a pre-intimation of the 
dawn — a night- voice, with as much of what is 
to be, as of what has been, sounding in it. It 
sets forth the fact of the death of Jesus. We 
pronounce that to be fact which the sceptic has 
often tried to prove to be deception. It sets 



NEARING SUNRISE. 415 

forth the necessity of His death — that without 
shedding of blood, there is, and has been, and 
can be, and will be, no remission of sin. The 
atonement is the golden thread that runs 
through all Christianity : withdraw it, and the 
whole system must be exhausted of its vitality. 
If there be one truth more vividly written upon 
the brow of that gospel than another, it is this 
— that the least sin that has swept through the 
heart with the speed of the transit of the 
lightning beam, and the greatest sin that ever 
was perpetrated upon earth, must be forgiven, 
if forgiven at all, in one way, through one 
sacrifice, and that the precious blood of the 
Lamb of God, that taketh away the sins of the 
world. It is not the fact, that great sins need 
an atonement, and little sins, as they are called, 
may be excused without it ; but it is the truth 
that sounds in every promise, that is inscribed 
on every page, that is demonstrable from the 
whole structure of Christianity, that there is no 
sin so minute as to be beneath the range, or the 
reach, or the necessity of its efficacy, and that 
there is no sin so heinous, and so great, as to 
be beyond its power to forgive and to take away* 
I have often viewed the communion-table in its 



416 NEARING SUNRISE. 

retrospective character : I wish to study it in 
its prospective character. The Apostle says, 
"As often as ye eat this bread, and drink this 
cup, ye do show the Lord's death :" that is re- 
trospective ; but he adds, " till he come," which 
indicates a prospective bearing. 

Christ fills the whole sphere of a Christian's 
being ; he is in all the hopes, the faith, the joys 
of a Christian's life — the alpha and the omega, 
the first and the last. This neither can be nor 
has been said of any other being, the head or 
founder of any other system that ever was pro- 
claimed in the language of man. There is 
something peculiar in the gospel in this respect, 
that it brings men, not into contact with a 
dogma, but into union and communion with a 
living Being — that being the Son of God, the 
Saviour of sinners. If I look backward, in the 
way in which we have already looked, I hear 
the name of Christ in every promise ; I see 
reflected the glory and the likeness of Christ 
from every type. Every harp, from Miriam's 
to Malachi's, resounds with His name; every 
type, from the earliest to the last, is the mirror 
of His beauty ; all the facts of history, all the 
phenomena of the past, are but pre-significant 



NEARING SUNRISE. 417 

signs and foreshadows of His advent, till all 
light becomes the dawn of His rising, and all 
sounds but the foot-fall of the approach of Him 
who came to suffer, and will come to reign. 
During the eighteen hundred years which have 
elapsed since that fact — that great central fact 
in the annals of eternity and time — occurred, 
viz., the death of Christ, He has been all, and 
in all, in the sufferings of His people, and in 
their consolations too. In the rise and ruin 
of empires, in the flourishing and decadence 
of churches, Christ's presence, Christ's book, 
Christ's principles, Christ's precepts, have been 
predominant. Expunge Christianity from the 
world, and there will be a blank behind too 
terrible for man to gaze on. 

That one fact, that Jesus died upon the cross, 
has more altered the aspect, and changed the 
history, and directed the current of human 
events, than all the triumphs of Alexander, and 
Caesar, and Napoleon, added together. Can it 
be a human event that has thus put forth a 
creative power? Can this be an ordinary fact 
that has transformed, ever as it touched, the 
aspect and history of mankind? Erase, then, 
that name from the earth, and its brightest 

E E 



418 NEAR1NG SUNRISE. 

spots would be disenchanted. Silence that 
sound which is the key-note of our songs, and 
all the harmonies of the world would be thrown 
into confusion. Take the Bible from us, and 
we should only learn, by the terrible gap that 
is left behind, what a mighty blessing, what a 
glorious possession, has been, in judgment or 
in chastisement, temporarily or for ever, re- 
moved from our hands. In that respect, then, 
to which I have alluded, the cross has been the 
chief thing, the sublime thing : so much so 
that Christians, as they have looked at it, have 
said what the Apostle said, and said from his 
heart — " God forbid that we should glory, save 
in the cross of Christ ! " 

The communion-table is but a central upon 
which the grand panorama of Calvary sweeps 
before us — a voice of the night ever swelling 
upwards ; — and the songs of the sanctuary are 
but the unspent, feeble echoes of those blessed 
words which closed that dread tragedy to Jesus, 
and opened these bright prospects to us : " It 
is finished." Thanks be to God for his un- 
speakable gift ? What shall we render to the 
Lord for all His benefits to us ? We will take 
into our hands the cup of salvation, and we will 






NEARING SUNRISE. 419 

call upon the name of the Lord. When, there- 
fore, we surround a communion-table, we do so 
to express our sense of infinite obligation, and 
to give embodiment to emotions of gratitude 
and devotedness. Upon the public platform, 
and in the public eye, we declare and assert 
what we have done in the closet, with the doors 
shut — that, be ashamed who may of Christ and 
Him crucified, we are not ashamed of the Gos- 
pel of Jesus. It is the basis of our hope ; it is 
the fountain of our joy ; it is the ground of our 
acceptance before God the Father in heaven. 
Well is its first night called u a night ever to 
be remembered ;" well has it been named by 
one, "the noontide of love;" and deeply may 
it be felt by us all to be a fact worthy of the 
gratitude of the thankful — the songs of them 
that loved Him — the celebration of all, in every 
age, and under all circumstances, " till He 
come " again. When a minister invites to that 
table, it is not to join the communion that he 
prefers ; it is not for any to associate themselves 
in membership with any body, party, or section 
upon earth ; it is still an oasis in the wilderness 
of sectarianism, to which people come as the 
Apostles came, when sects and systems w^re 

e e 2 



420 NEARING SUNRISE, 

not yet developed, "to do this in remembrance 
of Jesus/' and to show forth His death "till 
He come." If, in some excess of bigotry, ex- 
clusiveness, and fanaticism, we should try to 
appropriate that table, as the monopoly of a 
party, and not the common table of all Chris- 
tians, because spread by their common Lord — 
that Lazarus who was raised from the dead at 
Bethany, and who sat there before us — that son 
of the widow of Nam — that restored maniac of 
Gadara, "clothed, and in his right mind" — 
the Apostles of the first century, and the mar- 
tyrs of the second — Augustine, Jerome, Vigil* 
lantius, Agobard, Wickliffe, Luther, Knox, 
Cranmer, Latimer — if they could become ani- 
mate and vocal, would rise from the graves and 
rebuke us for trying to make that particular, 
which is catholic — that sectarian, which is for 
all who love the Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity 
and truth. 

But the light in which I have looked at this 
s abject has been, as I have said, its retrospec- 
tive bearing ; but it has, though it has not been 
looked at in this light, as I think it ought to 
have been, a prospective bearing. The Apostle 
says, we are to show forth His death " till He 



NEARING SUNRISE. 421 

come." I do not wish to look at these words, 
or even to moot the discussion of them, in a 
controversial sense. But, plainly, "till He 
come," must refer to the Saviour's second ad- 
vent, not to any previous advent that may, by 
possibility, be called so ; because if He has 
come, then the Sacrament has ceased. It is 
only to last " till He come ;" if He has come, 
and if the mode in which He has come can be 
pronounced to be the fulfilment of His words, 
then the Lord's Supper has passed away, and it 
ought not to be celebrated. But if the " till I 
come " be that advent which is often spoken of 
in the Scriptures, then there can be no doubt 
that we do his will when we celebrate this 
Supper ; and that we do so in the attitude of 
believers when we do it, looking to that era 
which is here denoted as His advent. There is 
something beautiful in this — that a communion- 
table connects the cross of Jesus and the crown 
of glory — that the crucified and the glorified 
are both associated with this blessed festival : 
so that, like the rainbow that John alludes to 
in the Apocalypse, one end of it rests upon the 
cross ; it then vaults into the sky, sweeps past 
the throne of intercession on which Jesus sits, 



422 NEARING SUNRISE. 

descends again to the earth, and rests upon the 
crown; thus forming, as it were, the pathway 
by which the Saviour rose, and along which He 
will travel again — describing the arc of mercy 
and of love that Jesus commenced on Calvary, 
and will finish and complete when the king- 
doms of this world become the kingdoms of 
our God and of His Christ, and He reigns for 
ever and ever. 

It is thus, too, and looking at it in this light, 
that the words of the Apostle are seen to be 
strikingly fulfilled : "Now abideth faith, hope, 
and charity " — or love. Faith looks backward 
to the cross, and derives its nutriment there ; 
love looks upward to Christ upon his throne, 
"whom having not seen it loves; in whom, 
though now it sees Him not, yet believing, it 
rejoices •" and hope looks forward to that day 
when He shall appear with many crowns, King 
of kings, and Lord of lords. Thus the faith, 
hope, and love of the Apostle, are the parasite 
graces that cling to the one Christ, draw their 
nutriment from the one sacrifice, and are in- 
separable from Him in whom they live, and 
move and have their being. Faith thinks of 
the High Priest's sacrifice without ; love thinks 



NEARING SUNRISE. 423 

of the High Priest's intercession in the holy 
place where He now is ; and hope waits expect- 
ing till He come forth, and bless the people 
that are looking for Him. It is thus that as 
a Christian I cannot be happy without a full 
Christ. I cannot so rivet my eye upon the 
cross that I shall be blind to His crown; I 
cannot be so fascinated by the future crown 
that I shall forget that he was crucified for me ; 
I may not lose His crown in his cross, nor His 
cross in His crown ; but rest upon the one for 
forgiveness of my sins, and anticipate the other 
for the satisfaction of all the yearnings of my 
heart, and for entrance into that perfect joy, 
felicity, and bliss, that are promised to the 
people of God. Faith looks to his cross, and is 
invigorated there ; love lifts its heart to His 
throne, and is rekindled there ; hope, with un- 
wearied wing, soars onward to the future, and 
is refreshed, and strengthened, and exhilarated 
there. Christ suffering, Christ interceding, 
Christ glorified, is the perfect Saviour ; faith, 
hope, and love, constitute the perfect graces of 
the perfect Christian. Christ's first advent 
finished the types of the Jewish economy; 
Christ's second advent will finish the rites of 



424 NEARING SUNRISE. 

the Christian economy. When he came the 
Passover passed away; and when He comes 
again the Lord's Supper itself will pass away. 
But until He come, the Lord's Supper is meant 
to be the place where we not only believe, but 
hope ; not only feed on Him, but look for Him 
a second time without sin unto salvation. 

The attitude of the church of Christ is that 
of constant looking forward. The whole Bible 
is full of that great time. Let me give some 
instances. " One like the Son of Man came 
in clouds of heaven ; and there was given unto 
him dominion and glory, and a kingdom, that 
all people, nations, and tribes should serve him. 
His dominion is an everlasting dominion, which 
shall not pass away, and his kingdom that shall 
not be destroyed." Again, in Jude : — "The 
Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints, 
to execute judgment upon all." Jesus tells us 
so himself. " When the Son of man shall come 
in his glory, and all the holy angels with him ; 
then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory." 
He tells us again : " I will not leave you com- 
fortless ; I will come again, and receive you to 
myself." Now these promises are just as true 
as the fact that Christ died." This was preached 



NEARING SUNRISE. 425 

by the Apostles : — " He shall send Jesus which 
before was preached unto you, whom the 
heavens must receive till the times of the resti- 
tution of all things ; of which times God hath 
spoken by the mouth of his holy prophets." 
Again, the Apostle says to Timothy: — "That 
thou keep this commandment without spot, 
unrebukeable, until the appearing of our Lord 
Jesus Christ : which in his times he shall show 
who is the blessed and only potentate, the 
King of kings, and Lord of lords." The 
angels preached the same fact : — " Two men 
stood by in white apparel, which said, Ye men 
of Galilee, why stand ye gazing into heaven? 
This same Jesus which was taken from you into 
heaven shall come in like manner as ye have 
seen him go." How did Jesus go? He rose, 
and a cloud received him out of sight. Well, 
says the angel, in the same manner Christ 
shall come again to this very earth. Again it 
is pronounced repeatedly in other passages : 
11 They shall see the Son of man coming in the 
clouds of heaven with power and great glory." 
" Hereafter shall ye see the Son of man sitting 
on ihe right hand, with power, and coming in 
the clouds of heaven." " The Son of man shall 



426 NEARING SUNRISE. 

come in the glory of his Father with his angels, 
and then shall he reward every man according 
to his works." " When the Son of man shall 
come in his glory." " The Lord Jesus shall be 
revealed from heaven with his mighty angels, 
in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that 
know not God." "The Lord himself shall 
descend from heaven with a shout, w.th the 
voice of the archangel and the trump of God." 
" The Son of man shall come in his glory, and 
all his holy angels with him." That ye may 
establish your hearts unblemished in holiness 
before God, even the Father, at the coming of 
our Lord Jesus Christ." Again : — " Lest com- 
ing suddenly he find thee sleeping." " There- 
fore be ready, for in such an hour as ye think 
not the Son of man cometh." No man can say 
that the heavens will not rend and the trumpet 
sound to-morrow. No man knows the day nor 
the hour ; and if there be any meaning in the 
New Testament, it is that the Christian is to 
stand ever expecting the hour when "the 
heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and 
the elements shall melt with fervent heat :" 
"for the day of the Lord cometh as a thief 
in the night." And when he comes what are 



NEARING SUNRISE. 

we to expect then? The dead in Christ shall 
rise first. " The Lord himself shall descend 
with a shout, and the dead in Christ shall rise 
first, and we which are alive shall be caught 
up to meet them in the clouds." And the end 
for which he comes is to complete our salva- 
tion. "To them that look for him shall he 
appear a second time without sin unto salva- 
tion." Let us ask that question, — "Are we 
looking for him ? Is this our state ? Is it to 
them that look for him that he will appear 
the second time without sin unto salvation?" 
And, says Peter : — " Kept by the power of God, 
through faith, unto salvation, ready to be re- 
vealed in the last time." Again : — " When he 
shall come to be glorified in his saints, and to 
be admired in all them that believe." "The 
Lord Jesus shall come and judge the quick 
and the dead at his appearing." " The Lord 
of hosts shall reign in Mount Zion and Jeru- 
salem, before his ancients gloriously." This 
period is called in other portions of Scripture, 
" times of refreshing from the presence of the 
Lord;" "the times of the " restitution of all 
things •" " the last time ;" " the glorious ap 
pearing of the great God and our Saviour 



428 NEARING SUNRISE 

Jesus Christ f " the day of our Lord Jesus 
Christ." 

All these passages, when taken together, 
constitute the full exposition of the words, 
"till I come;" and all of them show that the 
attitude of a true Christian, not only at the 
communion-table, where it is primarily so, but 
in all circumstances, is that of looking for the 
second personal appearing of Him who " shall 
change our vile body, and transform it into the 
likeness of his own glorious body." 

Now, the great scope of the Romish apcstasy, 
as the perfect contrast of the Christian Church, 
is to blind the eyes of her people to this great 
apocalypse, and to destroy and weaken the thirst 
of their hearts for this glorious appearing. She 
finds Christians looking and wishing for the 
advent of Jesus ; and what does she do ? She 
gives them an image or a likeness of Him in 
order to satisfy their thirst. They ask for the 
living bread — she gives them a dead stone. And 
lest in that blessed ordinance which we regu- 
larly celebrate, the thought should still rush 
into their hearts that we are to do it " till 
Christ come," and the earnest cry should spring 
from those hearts, " Come, Lord Jesus !" she 



NEARING SUNRISE. 429 

tells them that this desire is pacified in the 
sacrament, and that they are not to look 
beyond it for Christ, for that the bread they 
eat is turned into His soul and body, His 
divinity and humanity ; that He is personally 
present, and that they need not, therefore, look 
for Him. If there be one great perversion of 
the Gospel more marked than another in that 
system, it is its attempt to destroy in the yearn- 
ing heart of God's people that longing, thirsting 
desire, " Come, Lord Jesus, take the kingdom 
and reign for ever." But this ordinance, pre- 
served and celebrated in its purity, shows us 
that while we do so, we are not only to have a 
retrospective reference to his cross, but an 
onward and an upward aspiration after that 
blessed epoch when he shall take the crown, 
and reign for ever and ever : so much so, that 
this expectation is the attitude of every com- 
municant ; it is the polarity of a Christian's 
heart. He lives in the future as much as he 
lives in the past : for if the past gives him the 
ground of all his hopes, it is the future that 
gives him the gratification of those hopes. We 
are thus to look for the advent of Christ, because 
in this ordinance we are commanded to do so ; 



430 NEARING SUNRISE. 

we are to look for his advent, because the bride 
longs for the Bridegroom — the children look for 
the parent — the disciples pray for their Lord. 
All of us recollect his own blessed promise, — 
" I will not leave you comfortless ; I will come 
again, and receive you unto myself, that where 
I am, there ye may be also." 

The command given by the Apostle proves 
that we are to show forth the Lord's death, not 
till our death overtakes us, not till the millen- 
nium comes, but until Christ comes. Our hope 
is not the dawn, but the sun ; not a state on 
earth, but the presence of the Lord. Let us 
then notice the inducements we have thus to 
show forth Christ's death, thus to anticipate 
his advent. 

Why, in celebrating this sacrament, should 
we desire Christ's advent ? When he comes, 
there will be no more ordinances, memorials, 
or sacraments. When the substance comes, the 
shadow shall be swept away : when the sun 
rises, the stars that intimated his advent will all 
disappear ; the river is lost in the sea, the type 
in the antitype, the symbol in the substance; 
and we shall see a present Christ, not com- 
memorate or anticipate an absent Christ. 



NEARING SUNRISE. 431 

"When he comes, we shall no more see 
through a glass darkly. Truths that are full of 
impenetrable mystery now, shall then be lumi- 
nous ; events that are perplexing to us shall 
then be plain ; difficulties that now divide 
Christians shall then be done away ; obscu- 
rities that now lie upon the face of God's Word 
shall then disappear like mists before the rise of 
the morning sun. There will then be a glorious 
epiphany — a sublime apocalypse — we shall read 
God's Word no more in a reflected, and there- 
fore dim, light, but in the noon-day splendour 
of Him who shall be in the midst of His people, 
and shine before his ancients gloriously. W^e 
shall " see the King in his beauty, and the 
land that is far off." W r e shall no more say, 
every man to his brother, " Know the Lord : 
for all shall know him, from the least to the 
greatest." 

We cannot but anticipate this advent, because 
when He comes, the sufferings and sorrows of 
humanity shall all cease. " Here we groan 
within ourselves," says the Apostle; and he says 
in another place : " Not only they, but our- 
selves, which have the first-fruits of the Spirit, 
groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, 



432 NEARING SUNRISE. 

to wit, the redemption of the body." Iso one 
can doubt that in this life the body has an im- 
mense influence on the soul; they touch each 
other at so many points of contact, that what 
disturbs the one, interferes with the comfort of 
the other. Were it not for the clog* of a body 
that is allied to the dust, how much higher 
would our souls soar ! how much sweeter would 
our experience be ! But when Christ shall 
come, pains shall cease; aches, and fevers, and 
illness shall be unknown ; the body, raised from 
the dust, shall be the meet companion of the 
redeemed and glorified soul ; and we shall then 
not only see him as he is, but we shall love him 
as we ought. 

When he comes, the groans of nature shall 
all cease ; the curse pronounced upon the earth 
shall be reversed ; the grand benediction of our 
High Priest shall be pronounced; the thistles 
and thorns that are the symbols of the curse 
shall then disappear ; " the solitary place shall 
rejoice, and the desert shall blossom as the 
rose." The dissolving heavens and the dis- 
organised earth shall give place to a new heaven 
and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteous- 
ness; and He that sits upon the throne shall 



NEARING SUNRISE. 433 

make all things new. Therefore we anticipate 
and pray for his advent. 

We long for this advent, because when he 
comes, the dead who have fallen asleep in 
Christ shall then rise from their graves and he 
re-united with those from whom they have been 
severed, years, centuries, millennia ; and so shall 
they be for ever with the Lord. These Ave loved 
upon earth, who have loved us, whose dim 
images are all that the tablets of memory re- 
tain, and to meet with whom in the realms of a 
purer and a happier state is one of our cheering, 
bright, and best hopes, shall then rejoin us; for 
the Lord shall descend, " and the dead in Christ 
shall rise first." He will speak, "Arise, and 
come ! " and then, from the sands of the desert, 
from the depths of the sea, the dead shall 
answer, " We come, we come ! " From marble 
monuments, that have been raised by wealth to 
commemorate its excellence, and from the green 
sod that covers the poor beggar that fell asleep 
in Jesus, the dead will hear His voice, and 
answer, "We come, we come!" From altar 
pavements, and from silent urns, from hills and 
valleys, and from the dust that men tread upon, 
the dead shall start forth at the sound of that 

F F 



434 NEARING SUNRISE. 

trumpet, and answer, " We come, we come ! " 
And the dead dust of every risen one, kindled 
by a beam from that glorious sun, shall in- 
stantly be transformed into the likeness of 
Jesus : and, in the splendours and glories of an 
un setting sun, be for ever happy, because for 
ever holy, with the Lord. Is not such an 
epoch worth praying for ? Is not such a bright 
advent worth anticipating? And is not the 
communion-table a welcome scene, that enables 
us to feel that we are doing this, though with 
imperfect love, and in an imperfect dispensation, 
till He come who shall sweep it away, and re- 
store the substance of which it is but the dim 
symbol ? 

When he comes, the living saints shall meet 
the Lord in the air. The Apostle tells us that 
" the dead in Christ shall rise first ;" and then 
" we which are alive shall be caught up to meet 
the Lord in the air." No language can be 
plainer. This is not a controversial point, 
which admits of dispute, but a plain text. Let 
us try to realise it. Some silent eve, when the 
stillness of night broods over this great, this 
over-crowded capital — when the bacchanalian 
has retired to rest without thought, without 






NEARING SUNRISE. 435 

God, without prayer, -without a sense of grati- 
tude or an appeal for safety — when the Chris- 
tian has committed himself to the Shepherd of 
Israel that slumbereth not, nor sleepeth, one 
dread and piercing sound shall rend the heaven 
and the earth, louder ten thousand times than 
the loud thunder; and at that instant every 
sealed grave shall open, and " one shall be taken, 
and the other left;" and every door, however 
barred and bolted, shall be flung open, and two 
shall be together, and one shall feel a mysteri- 
ous virtue penetrating every limb and nerve 
and fibre, and shall rise under some mighty 
and mysterious impulse, irresistible and full of 
glory and of happiness, and meet the Lord in 
the air ; whilst the other that he loved shall be 
left behind. 

Anticipating that era, knowing not when the 
time may come, we have no business saying 
this or that must first take place. Our simple 
attitude is that which this blessed ordinance 
points out, giving neither date nor figure, but 
simply looking back from this day, and this 
place, and seeing nothing during the lapse of 
18.20 years but Christ upon the cross bearing 
our sins, and saying, " It is finished •" and then 

• p f 2 



436 NEARING SUNRISE. 

looking forward, it may be through days, it 
may be through years, it may be through a half 
century — it can scarcely be longer — and seeing 
nothing between us now and that bright and 
glorious epiphany — Christ and him crowned. 
So a Christian stands, so he believes, so he 
hopes, so he shows forth the Lord's death till 
he come. 

We anticipate this blessed epoch on another 
ground. As soon as Christ shall come, and only 
when he comes, death itself shall be destroyed. 
We are now very prone to say, " O death, 
where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy 
victory?" when a Christian dies. But such a 
voice uttered at present is anticipatory. It is 
a voice of the day, not of the night. We are 
told by the Apostle that death is not finally 
destroyed till the Lord himself shall come : 
for what does he say? (1 Cor. xv. 22.) — " As in 
Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made 
alive. But every man in his own order : Christ 
the first-fruits ; afterwards they that are Christ's 
at his coming. Then cometh the end, when he 
shall have delivered up the kingdom to God, 
even the Father ; when he shall have put down 
all rule and all authority. For he must reign 



NEARING SUNRISE. 437 

till lie liath put all enemies under his feet. The 
last enemy that shall be destroyed is death." 
Then that enemy is not yet destroyed. You 
need no scripture to convince you of this. What 
home has not been darkened by its shadow ? 
What heart has not been grieved and cut by 
the ravages he has left behind him ? But what 
heart does not rejoice that this enemy who has 
darkened so many homes, and broken so many 
hearts, and left so many gaps in happy brother- 
hoods and sisterhoods, is the enemy that shall 
be destroyed when Christ comes ? Therefore, 
when we take into our hands the bread and 
wine, we do show forth Christ's death, and we 
anticipate as the fruit of that death the time 
when death itself shall be destroyed. " Then 
only," says the Apostle, "when this corrup- 
tible shall have put on incorruption, and this 
mortal shall have put on immortality " — that 
is, when all Christ's people are raised — " then 
shall be brought to pass the saying that is 
written, ' Death is swallowed up in victory.' 
1 death where is thy sting ?' — [the song of the 
resurrection] — ( grave where is thy victory?' 
The sting of death is sin ; the strength of sin is 
the law ; but thanks be to God which giveth us 



438 NEARING SUNRISE. 

the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." 
" And therefore," he says, as if he prescribed 
for your feelings at that table, "my beloved 
brethren, be ye steadfast, immoveable, always 
abounding in the work of the Lord, forasmuch 
as ye know that your labour is not in vain in 
the Lord." 

Lastly, we are to look foward to this blessed 
epoch, because then, in soul, body, and spirit, 
we shall be made perfectly happy. There will 
then be a pure Church. The tares shall be 
gathered and cast into the fire ; the bad fishes 
shall be removed; the sons of God, now hid, 
shall be manifest ; and the whole rausomed 
Church of the Lord shall sit down at the mar- 
riage-feast of the Lamb, with Abraham, Isaac, 
and Jacob, and all that have fallen asleep in 
Christ. Is not this, then, worth anticipating? 
Do we not err sometimes when we so dwell 
upon the triumphs of the past that we do not 
anticipate the glories of the future? Do we 
not — without controversially looking at the 
varied interpretations of excellent men — fail in 
reaping the full happiness of the Gospel when 
we fail to look forward to the second advent of 
the Saviour, and to anticipate it as the era of 



NEARING SUNRISE. 439 

hopes and joys fulfilled, of gaps and chasms 
removed, of death and the grave destroyed, the 
dawn of perfect happiness, perfect joy, and un- 
wearied service of the Lord our God ? If this 
be so, then, just in proportion as we anticipate 
that glorious advent, will our hearts rise and 
rest where our Saviour Christ is. We are told 
that " wherever the treasure is, there will the 
heart be also." If we are looking into heaven 
for Christ to come from it, then our hearts will 
be joyful in heaven ; our treasure being there, 
our hearts shall be there also. Abraham leaped 
for joy when he looked for Christ's advent to 
suffer; how much more should we leap for joy 
when we anticipate Christ's advent to reign for 
ever and ever. Let this hope, then, be en- 
throned in our hearts; let it displace all meaner 
preferences ; let it extinguish all lesser lights ; 
let us look for that blessed day when Christ 
shall come, and the kingdoms of the world 
shall be the kingdoms of our God and of His 
Christ. 

If this be true, how joyfully should we join 
in the sacred festival of the Eucharist ? AVith 
whit readiness should we surround that table 
o . which rest rays from the past and rays from 



440 NEARING SUNRISE. 

the future — on which is the shadow of the cross 
— and on which there is reflected also the glory 
of the crown ! How gladly should we compass 
that holy table, whose memory looks through 
the vista of a thousand years, and sees the 
Saviour bearing our sins that we might inherit 
His righteousness ; and hears the echo of His 
triumphant accents — " It is finished ■" and by 
which our hope looks along the corridors of 
coming years, and sees with ecstasy the Son of 
man coming in glory, and hears already the 
first notes of that everlasting jubilee, " Halle- 
lujah, for the Lord God Omnipotent reignethi" 
And if we are to anticipate this blessed epoch, 
let us bear with patience and confiding magna- 
nimity, the trials, and sorrows, and afflictions 
of this present life. Let us bear in mind that 
earth is not the home, nor the grave the end, 
of the immortal soul. Let us feel that all we 
suffer upon earth is but the needed and predes- 
tinated discipline requisite to fit us for a better 
world. Let us bear in mind that the sorest 
tribulation is but a vestibule to glory, that 
there is a needs-be in the hardest and heaviest 
trial, and that the worst afflictions are the 
anointed messengers who are sent from the 



NEAHING SUNRISE. 441 

Lord to bow the proud heart, to break the hard 
spirit, to wean our affections from the world, 
where they are naturally disposed to cluster, 
and to fix them upon that bright and blessed 
rest that remaineth for the people of God. Let 
us nestle beneath the outstretched wings of our 
Father; let us anchor beneath the shadow of 
the Rock of ages ; and anticipate in the future 
the fulfilment of that hope which ushers in the 
brightness of everlasting day, and unites the 
bride to the Bridegroom, the children to their 
Father, the saved to their Lord, their all and 
in all. Let us henceforth celebrate the Supper 
by looking upon it as a pledge that Jesus will 
come, just as truly as a memorial that Jesus 
has come. I hear in its accents the voice of 
the sufferer, but I hear also the accents of the 
conquaror. I see sweep along that table the 
shadow of Calvary; I see reflected upon that 
table, too, the glories and the splendours of the 
millennial morn; I see in it God's great token 
that Jesus has suffered, and that therefore we 
are saved ; but I see in it also God's great 
pledge that Jesus will come again, and that 
therefore we shall be with him. It is thus that 
the past is luminous with mercy, that the future 



442 NEARING SUNRISE. 

unbosoms new blessings, and that the whole 
horizon, to a Christian's heart, tells of the 
goodness, the glory, and the promises of his 
God. 

Let me learn, in the next place, from this, 
how real is the unity of the Church of Christ. 
By the Church I do not mean a mere eccle- 
siastical convention of professors, who observe 
certain rites and celebrate certain orderly and, 
it may be, beautiful forms ; but the whole com- 
pany of God's believing, justified, and sanctified 
people : and for that church, strictly so called, 
the Church that was first, and shall be last, and 
shall reign for ever and ever, the true principle 
and bond of unity is, looking at one Christ in 
the past — looking forward to one Christ in the 
future ; seeing the whole sphere of time filled 
with the rays of that Sun of Righteousness who 
is about to rise and shine upon us in noon-day 
splendour. Let us not be ashamed to confess 
him ere he comes in his glory. Them that con- 
fess him before men will he confess before the 
Father in heaven. Let us henceforth come to 
this table, not because it is a custom, or a 
decent solemnity, or a passport to credit, accept- 
ance, and repute among mankind; but simply, 



NEARING SUNRISE. 443 

as our Saviour has taught us by the mouth of 
his Apostle, to commemorate the greatest fact 
the annals of the universe record — that Christ 
has suffered that we might he forgiven — and to 
anticipate with joy the brightest prospect that 
the universe will ever see, when Christ shall 
come, to them that look for him a second time, 
without sin unto salvation. Let us lift our eyes 
to the hills, and look longingly for the Sun of 
Righteousness. His first rays already sprinkle 
the distant mountain-tops, — the stars grow 
dimmer, — the night is far spent : — the children 
of the resurrection, weary, and yet waiting, cry 
with one voice — " Come, Lord Jesus !" The 
answer is recorded — " Unto you that fear my 
Name shall the Sun of Righteousness arise with 
healing on his wings." Even so, come, Lord 
Jesus ! 



CHAPTER XVI. 

THE VOICE CRYING IN THE DESERT 

u Follow with reverent steps the great example 
Of Him whose holy work was doing good ; 
So shall the wide earth seem our Father's temple, 
Each loving life r. psalm of gratitude. 

rt Then shall all shackles fall — the stormy clangour 
Of wild war music o'er the earth shall cease; 
Love shall tread out the baleful fire of anger, 
And in its ashes plant the tree of peace." 

" Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the 
way before me : and the Lord, whom ye seek, shall sud- 
denly come to his temple, even the messenger of the 
covenant, whom ye delight in : behold, he shall come, 
saith the Lord of Hosts." — Malachi iii. 1. 

There are two personages named in one 
passage from Malachi, who are called mes- 
sengers, perfectly" distinct from one another. 
cc Behold, I will send my messenger, and he 
shall prepare the way before me:" that is one 
person. And then, " the Lord," — Jehovah, — 



THE VOICE CRYING IN THE DESERT. 445 

"whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his 
temple, even the messenger of the covenant." 
This last is a distinct and a separate person. 
On the former only I would now offer a few 
remarks. The first person mentioned in the 
passage is plainly John the Baptist. This con- 
clusion we arrive at, not from conjecture, but 
from the positive assertion of those who were 
inspired by the Holy Spirit of God. We are 
told in the Gospel according to St. Mark, " As 
it is written in the prophets, Behold, I send my 
messenger before thy face, which shall prepare 
thy way before thee. The voice of one crying in 
the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, 
make his paths straight. John did baptise in 
the wilderness/' — and there is thus the appli- 
cation of the prediction of Malachi to John 
the Baptist. There is added to that prediction 
another given by Isaiah the prophet, in which 
he speaks of " a voice crying in the wilderness, 
Prepare ye the way of the Lord." We have 
the very same testimony also in Matthew xi. 10, 
and in Luke v i. 27. All of these distinctly and 
unmistakeably assert that the first messenger 
here spoken of is John the Baptist, and that 
Malachi s prediction was realised or made ac- 






446 THE VOICE CRYING 

tual in him. Here, then, is a minute prediction 
of a very special person, uttered three hundred 
years before that person appeared, and event- 
ually found to be minutely fulfilled in him, and 
in no other who steps upon the stage at any 
previous or subsequent time. The strongest 
evidence, if such were needed, of the inspiration 
of the ancient prophets, is found in the exact 
and minute fulfilment of these prophecies in the 
personages that appear in the New Testament 
Scriptures, sometimes seven hundred years, 
sometimes a thousand years after the prophecy 
had been uttered. 

How precious is this fact, that after God had 
described the utter profligacy of the whole 
Jewish church, he should reply to that profli- 
gacy by the prediction of a day of grand and 
beneficent interposition, issuing in salvation to 
them and glory to himself ! It is a most re- 
markable trait, running through the whole 
ancient Scriptures, that after God has described 
how dreadful were the sins of his people, instead 
of threatening penalty, as man does, he pro- 
mises, as God only does, glorious deliverance. 
One cannot but be struck, on reading these, 
with the thought, that judgment is God's 






IN THE DESERT. 447 

strange work, that mercy is his beloved attri- 
bute. When the nation's sins demand that the 
thunderbolt shall descend and destroy, instead 
of that minister of judgment there is seen 
gilding the black cloud the beauteous rainbow, 
the covenant memorial of mercy and truth that 
have met together, and righteousness and peace 
that have kissed each other. In Malachi, se- 
cond chapter, is a picture of the degeneracy of 
the church ; in the third is a prophecy of the 
interposition of a Saviour. The degeneracy I 
have referred to, as so largely and so minutely 
delineated by Malachi, was that of a church 
that had lineal succession in its priests, that was 
founded amid miracles, that was under what is 
called a theocracy, the immediate government of 
God himself. A church so founded, so tended, 
so peculiarly and prosperously situated, degene- 
rated into complete apostasy, and crucified the 
Lord of Glory, and ultimately had its candle- 
stick wholly removed from its place. Now, if 
there be such a thing as Apostolic succession, — 
which, I assert, in scripture is not known, and 
in history is a nonentity : for nothing is plainer 
to any reader of ancient ecclesiastical history 
than this, that to assert that on a personal 



448 THE VOICE CRYING 

lineal succession in the ministry of the Gospel 
from the days of an existing bishop, pope, pre- 
late, or presbyter, up to the days of the Apostles, 
is contingent the momentous question of church 
or no church, salvation or no salvation, sacra- 
ments or no sacraments, Christianity or no 
Christianity, is simply to play into the hands 
of the pope of Rome, or more probably into the 
hands of the successors of Voltaire, Diderot, 
Hume, or Paine j for the thing is historically 
not fact, and scripturally not required, — suppose 
there be such a succession, I yet argue from the 
past, it is no guarantee against the introduction 
of the most deadly error, or the occurrence of 
the most entire Apostasy. For here is a church 
— the church of the Jews — that had an his- 
torical succession unquestioned and unquestion- 
able : a church that had a reality, of which the 
modern pretension is but the sham and the 
shadow; founded amid miracles, perpetuated 
amid miracles, — not like those that Dr. New- 
man sets his name to, and professes his admir- 
ation of, but real miracles, — whose magnificence 
and grandeur, and end and use, w r ere worthy of 
the interposition of a God. Notwithstanding 
these privileges, this church plunged into an 



IN THE DESERT. 449 

apostasy from the truth, and a degeneracy from 
morality, so entire, that it rejected the Lord of 
Glor}r, and preferred Barabbas, a thief and a 
murderer, in his place. To those, therefore, 
who believe that they have this Apostolic suc- 
cession, I address not an uncharitable, but a 
seasonable remark, " Let him that thinketh 
he standeth take heed lest he fall j for if 
God spared not them, much less will he spare 
you- 

But I pass on to the immediate context of 
the passage I have read. It seems to me to 
prove, to take the lowest possible view, the pre- 
existence of the Lord Jesus Christ. " Behold, 
I will send my messenger." The Evangelists 
all say that these words were uttered by Jesus 
Christ, and the text shows they could have been 
uttered by none else. "And he shall prepare 
the way before me." What was John the 
Baptist's mission? It was to prepare the way 
before the Lord Jesus Christ. Therefore Christ 
existed in the days of Malachi. "And the 
Lord," — now, the word " Lord" is in capital 
letters, in order to show that it represents what 
the Jew considered the incommunicable name 
— Jehovah, a name peculiar to Deity. " The 

G G 



450 THE VOICE CRYING 

Lord shall suddenly come/' — that is, Christ^ 
advent, — " to his temple/' — which was the 
figure of his body, " even the messenger of the 
covenant, whom ye delight in : behold, he shall 
come, saith" God the Father, " the Lord of 
Hosts." Here, then, we have not only the 
pre-existence, but the Deity of Jesus. This 
doctrine be it remembered, is not a mere theo- 
logical dogma, which one may dispense with 
and yet be a Christian ; it is, in my humble 
judgment, the very core, and substance, and 
pith, and life, of all real religion. Take away 
the Deity of Jesus, and his sacrifice is no atone- 
ment ; and his death — it is a very strong state- 
ment, but I make it advisedly — was the death 
of a suicide; for he submitted willingly, and 
exposed himself willingly, to that death which 
he endured. But we know in whom we have 
believed ; we can say to him what we can say 
to no created being whatever, " Thou art the 
Son of God, Thou far the King of Glory, O 
Christ." 

We next learn from this passage, that the 
temple is the property of Jesus Christ, " Jeho- 
vah, whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to 
his temple." In what respect was the ancient 






IN THE DESERT. 451 

temple of Jerusalem the temple of Christ ? I 
answer, first, he himself said, " Destroy this 
temple, and in three days I will raise it up." 
This he spake of his body. The temple, there- 
fore, was the type or the symbol of his body. 
So we find that everything in the temple related 
directly or indirectly to the Lord Jesus Christ. 
The daily lamb that was slain upon the altar, 
was the type of the Lamb of God. Remem- 
bering this, we see how expressive were the 
words of John the Baptist, " Behold the Lamb 
of God : " these words were uttered in the 
morning, and no doubt at that moment when 
the morning lamb was being borne to the 
temple in order to be offered as the morning 
sacrifice; John turned the people's eyes from 
the type that was finished to the antitype, the 
Lord Jesus Christ, who had arrived, and said, 
"Behold the Lamb of God." So, in the same 
manner, the mercy-seat was the symbol of the 
great propitiation. The glory that shone be- 
tween the cherubim was the glory of Jesus 
Christ: — (f We beheld his glory," said the 
Evangelist, " the glory as of the only begotten 
of the lather, full of grace and truth." And 
the high priest was a shadow of Christ, the 

g g2 



452 THE VOICE CRYING 

true High Priest. I might go over the whole 
furniture of the temple, or rather, read the 
Epistle to the Hebrews, and there we should 
learn that the temple was justly his, because 
every court in it rung with his praise — every 
prefiguration in it was the shadow of his pre- 
sence — every sound in it was the footfall of the 
approaching Great Deliverer. What was thus 
said of the ancient temple ought to be and 
is true of every section of the true church 
of Christ. The church universal is Christ's 
church; it is not Cranmer's church, nor Knox's 
church, nor Wesley's church, but Christ's 
church. It is the awful blemish upon us all, 
that the names of men predominate in our 
theology more than the name of Christ ; and that 
we are distinguished upon earth, not by that 
only and magnificent name, " Christian," but 
by some surname that is of the earth, and to 
the earth must again return, that " Christ" and 
" Christian" may be all and in all. Surely, 
ecclesiastics do not act with the same humility 
with which men of taste act in relation to the 
fine arts. Once an ancient statuary put his 
own name too prominently on one of the statues 
he had chiselled ; and for that reason, notwith- 



IN THE DESERT. 453 

standing its artistic excellence, it was rejected 
by the accomplished Greeks. When an artist 
executes a work, his own name should be in 
some obscure nook of it. When a statuary- 
chisels out of the marble some beautiful bust, 
his own name should be in some hidden part of 
it, to be sought out — not prominent. When we 
select a church, or constitute a church, our own 
names, even the names of saints and Apostles, 
should be darkened and subordinated, in order 
that the name of Christ may be all and in all. 
Although it is a custom in England, and Scot- 
land too, to call churches by the names of saints, 
— St. Andrew's, St. John's, St. James's, St. 
Stephen's, — yet, it is not a very beautiful prac- 
tice. The name " Christ," " Christian," should 
alone be prominent, yea, all and in all. He 
redeemed the Church by his blood, he selected 
it, he gave it his Spirit to sanctify it ; it is his 
Word that is read in it, not man's ; it is his 
Gospel that is preached in it ; it is his praise 
that is sung in it; it is in his name that we 
pray; and therefore every pulpit should echo 
with his name, and every pew should be filled 
by those who thirst for his truth. Prayer 
should be offered up through his mediation ; 



454 THE VOICE CRYING 

the whole church visible should be radiant with 
the glory of Christ; and it should be there 
what the martyr said when he was tied to the 
stake, — in the church, as in the heart, — "None 
but Christ, none but Christ." Just in propor- 
tion as we rise in spirituality, in purity, in 
scriptural character, will this be the case. 

Christ is here said, not only to have the 
temple for his, but to be " the messenger of the 
covenant." The Baptist is called " my messen- 
ger;" if Jesus be " the messenger of the cove- 
nant," in what sense can the Baptist be called 
Christ's messenger? It was the custom with 
ancient kings to send messengers before them, 
to prepare their way, and signal their approach. 
And the very appointment of a messenger to 
precede Jesus, even in his humiliation, was a 
forelight and evidence of his royal dignity, as 
the King of his church. But what John the 
Baptist did for Jesus personally, ministers of 
the Gospel are still to do for him, now that he 
is at the right hand of God, in the glory of God 
the Father. A minister of the Gospel is beau- 
tifully described by Malachi, as a messenger. 
Who is the messenger one would rather employ? 
Surely, the man who delivers one's message the 



IN THE DESERT. 455 

most fully. And who is the hest messenger or 
minister of Christ ? Not he who adds to his 
message something to commend it, or who 
deducts from the message something that he 
thinks tends to make it unpopular ; but he who 
renders the message with which he has been 
intrusted in its greatest truthfulness and purity. 
And what is the dignity of a minister of the 
Gospel ? That he is sent out by Christ as a 
messenger. What is the dignity of a soldier? 
Not that he wears a red coat, but that he carries 
the queen's commission. What is the dignity 
of a minister of the Gospel ? That he carries 
the commission of the Lord Jesus Christ. God 
has placed the people in that position that they 
can judge, if they be Christians, whether he 
delivers his message or not. If the Bible were 
the monopoly of the clergy, and in no respect 
the possession of the people, then they might 
deliver what sentiments they liked, and the 
hearer could not tell whether it were God's 
message or not. But the economy of the 
Gospel is, that, while the minister shall pro- 
claim the message, the people shall have the 
original Book, and they may reject his message, 
if it has not its counterpart there ; while they 



456 



THE VOICE CRYING 



are bound to receive his message, if it be the 
echo of what is there. Therefore, the most effec- 
tive episcopacy or presbytery that a preacher 
can have, is the Bible in every pew. It has been 
noticed in Scotland as an interesting fact, that 
the preacher cannot refer to a passage in scrip- 
ture, without the audience turning over the 
leaves of their Bibles to see if it is so : this is 
a truly Protestant habit; and so long as we 
refer to its page, trying all by its testimony, 
taking no man's ipse dixit, but bringing even 
an angel from heaven, if he were to appear in 
the pulpit, to that blessed Book, so long none 
will be led fatally or far to err. 

We are told, " Behold, he shall come, saith 
the Lord of hosts." There can be little mistake 
about the meaning of this, and there can be 
less now about its fulfilment. It is, however, a 
very remarkable fact, that God's prophecies 
respecting the Advent of his Son seem to 
have spread athwart the whole habitable globe, 
and in the shape of traditional echoes to have 
been dispersed over all the world. The great 
promise of a Messiah, which was the grand 
truth that the Jew clung to in his most despe- 
rate fortunes, found itself translated into heathen 



IN THE DESERT. 457 

tongues, and accepted even by heathen men. 
For instance, the poet Virgil dedicates a poem 
to Pollio, his patron, in which he says, that one 
would soon be born into the world, who, it was 
expected, would bring in the golden age. The 
Sibyl leaves were plainly borrowed from the 
prophet Isaiah. Suetonius, an ancient historian, 
states, too, what is a remarkable proof of the 
spread of this idea, that a certain and settled 
persuasion prevailed in the East, that the cities 
of Judea, would bring forth, about this time, 
a person who should obtain universal empire. 
And Tacitus, the eloquent historian, but the 
very incredulous one, who called the Christian 
religion, execrabilis superstitio, states that it 
was contained in ancient books of the Jewish 
priests, that the East should prevail, and that 
a power should proceed from Judea that should 
possess universal dominion. These were scat- 
tered lights that went out from Judea, their 
reuniting centre, and gave the heathen an 
anticipation and a persuasion that some great 
and illustrious deliverer was about to be born 
in the world. Jesus came accordingly, we are 
told, in the fulness of the times, — " the Mes- 
senger of the Covenant." 



458 



THE VOICE CRYING 



It is also predicted that his advent to his 
temple would be its greatest glory. He " shall 
come to his temple." This is a promise, and 
every promise means that it would be something 
good; and Christ's coming to his temple must 
be that which is the greatest good, or the glory 
of that temple. It is so still. It is Christ in 
his church that is a church's greatest glory — a 
church's greatest good. No ceremony, no 
splendour of ritual, no processional pomp, can 
be any substitute for an absent Christ; and 
Christ present in the midst of a people, without 
companion and without comparison, is the light 
that lightens the Gentiles, and is the glory of 
his people Israel, So, Jesus promises that 
where two or three are met together in his 
name, there will he be in the midst of them. 

But Christ is called, as I have already 
noticed, " the Messenger of the Covenant." 
What is this covenant ? In the simplest form 
in which I can define it, it is a dispensation. 
The Apostle Paul describes that covenant when 
he says (Hebrews viii. 10, 11): "This is the 
covenant that I will make with the house of 
Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will 
put my laws into their mind, and write them 



IN THE DESERT. 459 

in their hearts : and I will be to them a God, 
and they shall be to me a people : and they 
shall not teach every man his neighbour, and 
every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord : 
for all shall know me, from the least to the great- 
est." This is the covenant that God will estab- 
lish. It means that Christ should come forth, 
a Saviour — that through him God's blessings 
might come upon us ; and by him our suppli- 
cations should rise to God ; and that to him we 
are to seek, in order to obtain the pledged and 
the promised mercies of the covenant of grace. 

But Jesus, the Messenger of the Covenant, 
is spoken of as regarded by his people in two 
respects. He is " the Lord whom ye seek;" 
and he is, in the second place, the Lord " whom 
ye delight in." He is, first of all, u the Lord 
whom ye seek." In ancient times, Abraham 
saw Christ's day from afar, and leaped for joy 
as he saw it. And throughout the whole of the 
Jewish dispensation, the Christians, not of the 
age, but in spite of the corruptions of the age, 
— the few who thought upon God's name, and 
feared the Lord, — looked for, and saw the 
Advent of Christ, as the fulfilment of the pro- 
mised blessing, — a promise ancient as the Fall, 



460 THE VOICE CRYING 

and given by God himself. If we are Christ's 
people, we shall constantly seek him. We shall 
come to the sanctuary seeking Christ. Our 
heart will find its polarity in him ; our souls, 
their rest and their repose in him ; our reason 
and our conscience will find — the one its satis- 
faction, and the other its peace, in him. In the 
sermon, we shall seek not flowers and ornaments, 
and rhetoric, but Christ. In the sanctuary, we 
shall look not for beauty of architecture, but for 
Christ. Our great end in meeting, our great 
thirst when we meet, our ardent prayer at the 
Throne of Grace, will be, that we may find Him 
whom our soul seeks. Christ alone can satisfy 
our anxious inquiry — How shall man be just 
with God? Christ alone can show us whither 
we are going, and where we shall be, and what 
we shall be, when this world, and things seen 
and temporal, shall be no more for ever. To 
seek him is, therefore, to seek the jewel of 
inestimable value, — the sun that lightens us — 
the bread that feeds us — the living water that 
refreshes us. A Christian is one seeking to 
know more of his Saviour; and the more he 
knows, by a strange but universal law, the 
more he seeks to know, of Christ. 



IN THE DESERT. 461 

It is added, as another feature in every 
Christian, and especially the feature of the 
Christians in the days of Malachi, — the few and 
the far between, as they were, — " They delight 
in Christ." Almost every Apostle in the New 
Testament tells us that joy or delight in Christ 
is a great Christian characteristic : " Whom 
having not seen, ye love : in whom, though 
now ye see him not, yet believing, ye re- 
joice with joy unspeakable and full of glory." 
(1 Peter i. 8.) And the Apostle Paul says, 
" Rejoice in the Lord always." And two-thirds 
of the kingdom of heaven is " peace and joy :" 
" The kingdom of heaven is righteousness, and 
peace, and joy." The first impression produced 
by the reception of the Gospel is joy ; and the 
next is temperance, patience, brotherly kindness, 
charity. The aspect in which we receive the 
Gospel is "as good news;" and we know the 
response to good news is not holiness in the 
first instance, but happiness. When we hear, 
therefore, that Christ died and suffered, that we 
might have salvation, and that there is no reason 
on this side of heaven, or on the other, why we 
should not be saved, except our own rejection of 
the remedy, it should instantly be responded to 



462 



THE VOICE CRYING 



by joy, and that joy will originate gratitude, 
and that gratitude will originate love, and love 
is the fulfilling of the law ; for the law is love 
in practice, and love is the law in principle. 
Thus joy is the spontaneous response of every 
Christian heart, when he knows the good news, 
that there is a Saviour for the chiefest of 
sinners. 

Let me ask, Do we delight in the Lord Jesus 
Christ? Do we delight in his presence? I 
know no finer test of Christian character than 
this : Are we ever in a place or in circumstances, 
where the idea, the thought, the shadow of 
Christ, would be an intrusion? If we feel that 
our position jars with a sense of his presence, 
there is something in it wrong. It does not need 
logic, it does not need reasoning ; there is an 
instinct in the human heart surer than logic, 
and truer than argument, that tells such a one 
that he is where he should not be, or he is 
doing something he should not do, when he 
feels that if Christ were present, he would be in a 
false position, or he could not bear it. The idea 
of God is ever a solemn one, but it is not an 
awful one. I fear, the most ordinary idea of God 
is, that he is some terrific, awful being. That 



IN THE DESER1. 463 

has been the teaching of the great Western 
apostasy, inculcating the idea of God as a ter- 
rible being, whose nearness is to be deprecated : 
whereas, if I understand the New Testament, 
— and the reader can judge, — its very first idea 
is, that we should feel the presence of God as a 
child feels the presence of a mother — a son the 
approach of a father ; and walk with him, not 
as a crouching slave before a scourging tyrant, 
but as a loving son in the sunshine of the face 
of a loving father. That is the very first idea 
of the Gospel. God is love, and Christ is the 
channel of that love to us, as well as the ex- 
ponent how great it is. When we come into 
the sanctuary, the presence of Christ should 
there be realised, sensibly felt. It is not fana- 
ticism to say so. When a person feels the light 
of the sun, it is evident that the sun shines ; 
and when we feel in our heart kindling joy, 
strengthening conviction, and maturing hopes, 
prospects, peace, — there is the evidence that 
Christ is touching our hearts, and that our 
hearts respond to him. And he himself tells 
us, " Wheresoever two or three are met together 
in my name, there am I in the midst of them/' 
This is not a figure of speech : it is a fact ; a 



464- 



THE VOICE CRYING 



Christian can say, " If thy presence go not -with 
me, carry rne not np hence." Surely, if we 
realised this one thought, that Christ's presence 
is the essence of church and Christianity, there 
would be fewer quarrels about churches. For 
instance, all the peers of the realm meeting to- 
gether do not constitute the court ; the queen 
must be amongst them that they may be a 
court. All the architects of England, combin- 
ing their skill, could not build a palace ; it is 
the queen taking up her residence in it that 
makes it a palace. All the processions of Rome 
and Greece combined, all the priests and bishops 
in the world, all rites and ceremonies together, 
cannot constitute a church ; it is only Christ in 
the midst of two or three : if he be there, there 
is a church ; if he be absent, there may be the 
splendid trappings of the dead, but there are not 
the beating hearts of Christians made alive unto 
God. It is Christ in the midst of his people 
that makes a church, and in the absence of that 
nothing else will. Nor will a Christian be 
satisfied with anything else. Splendid form 
pleases the eye ; but he comes hungry for bread. 
Beautiful music may charm the ear; but he 
comes for bread. An eloquent sermon may 



IN THE DESERT. 465 

captivate the fancy; beautiful figures of rhe- 
toric may tickle the imagination ; sound and 
logical argument may satisfy the reason ; but if 
there be not in the sermon an exhibition of that 
which is the desire of the deepest depths of our 
hearts, that sermon is but heresy, or worse. 
We delight in Christ. 

If, then, in the language of this beautiful 
passage, we delight in Christ, "the messenger 
of the covenant, whom ye delight in," I would 
notice, in a very few divisions, some respects 
in which we shall do so. First, we shall delight 
in his day, which is just the reflected light 
of the Sun of righteousness. If we delight 
in Christ, we shall delight in his day. To a 
Christian worn out with the turmoil of the 
week, in this great mill or factory which we 
call London, what an escape — what a blessed 
escape is it to get within four walls, beyond 
the reach of the counting-house, and the 
machinery amid which we have constantly to 
toil, and far from the ceaseless roar of this 
restless sea of living beings ! What a treat 
to be able to retire from all, and in some 
sequestered spot — the more sequestered the 
better — to hear of a better land, of bright 

H H 



466 THE VOICE CRYING 

hopes, of a blessed future, and of an open way 
to heaven ! Were our Sabbaths to depart, our 
sanctuaries would very soon moulder in the 
rains of heaven. Let us keep the Sabbath by 
setting an example of calling it a delightsome 
day ; and let us honour it, by showing ourselves 
in the sanctuary, and regarding its exercises, 
and its duties, and its privileges as joyful and 
happy in the experience of our hearts. If we 
delight in Christ, we shall delight in his day, 
and we shall endeavour, as we have opportunity 
and power, to maintain and to preserve in all its 
integrity that day, — the Sabbath. T know not 
whether it be created by Christianity, or 
whether it be the test, or the index of the 
amount of Christianity, but one or other the 
the Sabbath certainly is. We may judge of 
a nation's religion by a nation's Sabbaths. On 
the continent of Europe there is hardly any 
religion, and there are no Sabbaths; and in our 
land there are, with all their defects, precious 
Sabbaths, and so we have a purer Christianity 
than any other land. One deeply regrets that 
in Germany the Lutheran Church holds so low 
an idea of the Sabbath as it does. I do not 
mean that our Sabbath should be like the 



IN THE DESERT. 467 

Jewish one, — a day of rigid ceremonies, of 
mechanical devotions; on the contrary, it should 
be a day for the reciprocity of everything that 
is beneficent and good. But primarily it is the 
day for casting our reckoning, learning where 
on this sea of life we are, our latitude, our 
longitude, whither we are going, and what 
progress we have made. 

If we delight in Christ, we shall, in the next 
place, delight in his "Word. The Bible and the 
Sabbath are two of our best and greatest privi- 
leges. I know nothing so precious in our 
whole possession as that Book, the Bible. The 
Sabbath is only second, if indeed it be second, 
to it : for what is the Bible ? It is the voice of 
God sounding along the ages ; it is the phar- 
macopoeia in which are divine prescriptions ; it 
is God's balance. Christ is the Tree of Life, 
and the texts of this Book, which holy men of 
old spake as they were moved by the Holy 
Ghost, are the leaves of that Tree. The Bible 
is a deep and a yet unexhausted ocean, the floor 
of which is covered with precious pearls ; and 
he who dives the deepest and the oftenest will 
bring up the richest and rarest. It is that 
Book which is to the voyager to heaven, to 

h h 2 



468 THE VOICE CRYING 

eternity, what his compass and his chart arc to 
the mariner. Without it Ave cannot sail surely, 
without it we cannot die happily. If we delight 
in the Saviour, that is, if we be Christians at 
all, this blessed book will be dear to us; we 
shall study books that illustrate it ; wait upon 
the ministry that explains it. What is the 
duty of the minister of the Gospel? To solve 
what seems difficulties in it; to make plain 
what seems intricate in it. And the ministry 
that makes us understand the Bible most 
clearly may not be the most eloquent, but it is 
the most useful. Here is our great mission ; 
if ministers fail here, they fail in the great end 
of their appointment on earth. Let us then 
study this Book. Do not supersede it by the 
idle and airy romance, or by the newspaper. 
Not that I would proscribe the newspaper; I 
think the modern newspaper is one of the most 
wonderful things in the world ; and in this day, 
when ancient prophecies are fulfilling in every 
day's history, one finds in the newspaper the 
most striking proofs of the inspiration, and the 
most powerful evidences of the fulfilment, of 
God's Word. But do not read the Bible in the 
light of the newspaper, but the newspaper in 



IN THE DESERT. 469 

the light of the Bible; but do not supersede 
the Bible by the newspaper. You may stoop 
down to sip from the stream as you pass by one, 
but the other you must live en, and feed on, 
and drink of, as a living fountain of living- 
waters which you cannot do without. 

If we delight in Christ, we shall delight also 
in his people ; ' and this is the last feature I 
w r ill mention, a test as well as a feature. If we 
love the Saviour, we shall love them that are 
his. With too many of us it is the tendency to 
love sucli a one, because he is a member of the 
good old church that we belong to, or loves the 
peculiar dissent that we prefer ; or because he 
likes our prayer-book, or our form of worship. 
Such is not delighting in Christ, and therefore 
delighting in Christians ; but it is delighting in 
church or dissent, and therefore delighting in 
churchmen or dissenters. The characteristic of 
a Christian is, that, while he has his preference 
in things ecclesiastical, which he may justly 
have, his principle of delight in Christ makes 
him delight in a Christian in spite of his pres- 
bytery, his episcopacy, or his dissent. He can 
penetrate the exterior ecclesiastical wrappage, 
and see beneath it the heart of a Christian, the 



470 THE VOICE CRYING IN THE DESERT, 

person of a follower of the Lamb. And if we 
delight in Christ, we shall love all Christ's 
people. In spite of what we think not most 
beautiful in our estimate, but because they are 
Christ's, we shall love them, preferring his 
superscription and image upon them to any 
other stamp or impress that man can strike. 

Blessed be God that the Messenger of the 
Covenant is come ! Blessed be God that some 
of lis can say, Though we do not love him as we 
ought, we would love and delight in him more ! 
Blessed be God that, though we do not seek 
him with that intensity with which we should, 
we can say, that we can travel far, and face 
many a storm, in order to hear his Word 
preached ; and that we can sacrifice not a little 
in order that we may love that Word more ; 
and that we have a firm faith that Christ is 
ours, and no mean hope that neither life nor 
death shall separate us from the love of God 
which is in Jesus Christ our Lord. 



YUITUE AND CO., CITY ROAD, LONDOK. 










*«.'. 























• 





: % *** . \ ^ / 



.#• •$. 



*P A® ^ <^>$5^IY^ ' ' '""' Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. 




Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide 



Treatment Date: Oct. 2005 

PreservationTechnologies 

A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVATION 

1 1 1 Thomson Park Drive 
Cranberry Township, PA 16066 
(724)779-2111 







% ^ 



^ ^ % 911 v \ v s s« -,, ^ 




N C 



s 0o ^ v^ 




mii 



1 



Hell 

H 

HI 

HI 

HH 

1111 

wHRsr 




HI Nil 



Uyyg 



J 



BL 




